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#Go make 2019 awesome

an-extrodinary-blog-for-el-topo · 23 hours

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How is your relationship with your friends?

...do you Miss Black Sheep?

(yes hi creator is back anyways Anon, when you Anon, Anon when I catch you Anon, Anon when I catch you anon)

It's very nice..a lot of things are nice actually.

Crackle, he's in my opinion, the best..ahem, don't tell Le Chèvre that...thank you.

As I was saying, he is very, very fun to be around with, no wonder Black Sheep saw him as an older brother. I admit that there was a time where I thought as well, but now I don't, I was at least 19 back then......wait..I can't be that old..how old am I even..like..24 ..I think..then, I turn 25..in less than a month..oh. 😨

Tigress is uhm, okay to be with. I don't approve of her behaviour, especially with Black Sheep, but she can lighten the mood ever so barely. I don't think she's a bad person, more of a troubled one..VILE does contain many people with things troubling them, I'm no exception either. The only person she actually gets along with is Le Chèvre, but they only just make fun and gossip. I hope she changes soon or later, she can take her time.

If I start talking about Le Chèvre I might just end up making it as long as it already is. Uhm.. where to begin..there's a word I'm looking for..I know it in Tagalog and Spanish but I forgot the English saying of it..ehh..oh wait..uh..forgot it at this point I'll just say it in Spanish..it is "marilag"..no wait that's Tagalog.."majestuoso" is the Spanish term, I wonder why I mix them up often, it's not they are the same language..

Our relationship is better than more couples in my opinion. We were basically, inseparable on the island. But now that we are actually dating it's more like the average married couple who has been together for at least twenty-years, and we aren't even married (yet.) ..no wait..(actually they are -creator said so) hold on, me having completed a quarter of my life is messing with my head..

Our relationship isn't bad, it's just that some days he's actually nice to me and some days he treats me like he treats everyone else, and someday he's not nice to himself. Tigress calls him a uhm, "fem queen"..? Is that just some American label..or uh... But if I ask him to go and let's say, jump off a cliff, he would do it's just that he'll be questioning heavily before he eventually does it, that counts, not that I am going to tell actually to do it..

That last of your ask though, I don't like being questioned a lot. If I say what I want to say here then The Faculty would get involved, or then Le Chèvre would find it and one) try to make me not miss her, or 2) look for makeup remover because he would be crying with me. And yes I did just admit I do cry whenever I think about Black Sheep.

Yes, I miss her, we all miss her. All except Tigress to be clear..Tigress technically does miss her, just not in the way you would expect, like, miss making her life just hard for no reason.

Le Chèvre used to say back on the island that I'm way more suited for the older brother role than Crackle because of the amount of time I spent with her back on the island before graduation. Yes we did have some good times, but I don't believe that. I'm more of a side character, while she's the main character, I would say.

I guess it wouldn't be right to call her Black Sheep because now she's going by Carmen SanDiego..I don't think Carmen was in the wrong when she left the island. Sure, having riches and prosperity is nice but, she didn't believe in the thing you'll have to do in order to gain that. And I confess that sometimes I mess around with the things set up for my capers sometimes just to make it easier for her. But then in the process, Le Chèvre gets more annoyed by the fact she can capture her for good, i think he is just either annoyed or mad at her for what she did that day.

Now that I'm writing this I still question why Shadow-san decided to fail Black Sheep when she was the best in the class. She has yet to tell me that, but that's the day I get to make cookies with her again like we did back on the island.

👋

(hi creator is back Anon I will find you and when I find you no one else will find you after that okay okay good night Anon)

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famewolf · 2 months

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actually used r*ddit for the first time in a thousand years just to comfort a self proclaimed 'grown ass man' regarding his feelings about feeling lost and grieving over the death of RT.

I usually stay away from commenting on public forums and the like, but he was clearly confused and didn't understand why he was hurting and it was frustrating him. it genuinely makes me so sad that a lot of cis men deeply struggle with allowing themselves to feel sadness if it doesn't directly relate to someone close to them dying.

and so I kind of said as much. told him that just because RT wasn't a real human doesn't mean that the decades of comfort it brought him didn't matter. that the brain doesn't differentiate between the loss of a person vs. the loss of something intangible that was still incredibly important.

told him to give himself the grace to grieve and be sad that something he loved was ending and that he wasn't the only one feeling that way. and surprisingly he replied and said he really needed to hear that, as did a couple of other dudes. which made me glad I said something. it sucks that they feel like they need permission or a reason to feel hurt/grief tho

there's definitely a strangeness to feeling grief over the end of media. but if it impacted your life for the better, then of course you're going to feel sad and lost. especially from folks you've been watching the better part of two decades.

#[static]#putting it under a read more because im being long-winded about it #RT was a big part of my life in the 2010s and i met a lot of great people because of it #i stopped watching around 2019-2020 due to life stuff and the controversies going on #but then f**ckface showed up and it's been one of the few podcasts that i genuinely enjoy and make me feel safe and comfortable #the content they made became too much for me to keep up with so i stopped for the most part #but f**ckface was the best of it all and brought me back to the good old days :) its hard to describe but it just felt magical #anyways i think ppl should be allowed to grieve even if there was 'writing on the walls' or whatever #RT is not without its issues for sure but a lot of them grew as people in to genuine good folks and that's awesome #and even though i only partake in a very small part of RT nowadays i too will be very sad to see it go #im going to watch the livestream in an hour and keep an ear out for if folks end up working on new projects

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st4rg1rl-16 · 2 months

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━━ ✶✶˖° 𝗖𝗛𝗔𝗣𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝗦𝗘𝗩𝗘𝗡 | 𝗡𝟰𝗦.

𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴(𝘀) ━ 2019 to 2023!f1 grid x driver!female oc

𝘀𝘂𝗺𝗺𝗮𝗿𝘆 ━ in a club max, lando and carlos make a plan to discover if the ferrari drivers are in a relationship, how? making charles jealous!

𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗲 ━ 2019, 24 march

𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 ━ barcelona, spain

𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 ━ they are in a club so alcohol consumption jealous!charles, the boys being the little shits they are, fingering (wait what?!) lewis kinda flirting with bella?

𝗮𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗿 𝗻𝗼𝘁𝗲 ━ I been MIA I know, sorry for that but here it is!!and things are starting to get heatedddd

𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗹𝗶𝘀𝘁 ━ @namgification @louvrepool @d3kstar @omgsuperstarg @whoselly @yl90 @wcnorris

• — need for speed’s masterlist

𝗴𝗾𝘀𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗻

♡ liked by 𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗯𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗮_𝘁𝟵, 𝗽𝗶𝗲𝗿𝗿𝗲𝗴𝗮𝘀𝗹𝘆 and 𝟴𝟲.𝟬𝟲𝟴 𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀

𝗴𝗾𝘀𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗻 After revolutionizing not only the motorsport world but also our hearts, Arabella Torres is crowned with the title of the new "it girl" of Europe.

"I've spent this last month hating my body and I'm tired of pretending that everything is fine" The Formula One driver opens up to us showing us her most vulnerable side about hate on social media and several other topics in the interview for the 200th issue of our magazine, now available on 💥 our link💥

Text: 𝗰𝗹𝗮𝘆𝘀𝗸𝗶𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗲𝗿

Interview: 𝘁𝗼𝗺_𝗹𝗮𝗺𝗼𝗻𝘁_𝗷𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘀𝘁

Photograph: 𝗷𝗮𝗰𝗸_𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗱𝗴𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗱_𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗱𝗶𝗼

Styling: 𝗺𝗼𝗯𝗼𝗹𝗮𝗷𝗶𝗱𝗮𝘄𝗼𝗱𝘂

𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗯𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗮_𝘁𝟵 have been tagged

𝗴𝗾𝘀𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝘀 🏎️🏎️🏎️

⤷ 𝗴𝗾𝘀𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗻 😍

𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟭 Wait, I’m running to get it

𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟮 I wasn’t a big fan of her but since I saw the live I love her

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟯 the same happened to me

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟰 Sorry for my ignorance, but what happened? I just got into the fandom.

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟯 Last month she was sexualized a lot on twitter because some youtubers uploaded a video and mentioned sexual things about her body, she went viral and began to have even more hate than she already had and made a live saying that she was going to leave social media for a while and then talked about how bad she felt, how it was a shame for her family and how it was “staining” her career. She basically talked about how bad it is to sexualize and also took out things like sexism and things like that (+)

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟯 (+) Then she left social media and we only saw her in the Shanghai and Azerbaijan gps and during these four weeks a lot of celebrities have talked about her and she has gone viral and now she is like the “it girl”.

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟱 ooooh, thanks for the explanation 💖

𝘀𝗰𝘂𝗱𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗿𝗮𝗿𝗶 That’s our girl!! 😌

𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗯𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗮_𝘁𝟵 muchas gracias por darme esta oportunidad! 🤍thank you very much for giving me this opportunity!

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟲 aww she is so cute, why do people hate her?

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟳 Unfortunately there are many people throwing hate at her even though she is a great person

⤷ 𝗴𝗾𝘀𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗻 Te queremos, Arabella! 🥰 We love you!

𝗱𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗲𝗹𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗼 ARABELLA TOOOOOOOORRESSSSSSSSS

𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗯𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗮_𝘁𝟵 and 𝟭𝟮𝟳 𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀 liked this comment

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟴 my ship 🥺

𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟵 What they've done to her is horrible, now she hates her body when she's beautiful

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟭𝟬 I would kill for having a body like hers

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟭𝟭 that’s how society works 🙂

⤷ 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲𝟭𝟮 she is probably going to get even more hate after this

"IT would be awesome if your first victory was in Spain" Oliver's smile was focused by the camera. His mother snapped her tongue looking at him with reprimand.

"Oli, son, don't swear on the table, please" The boy looked at his mother and gave her his most charming smile.

"Yes, mommy" The woman rolled her eyes and threw her napkin in his face so he complained while her husband laughed.

Arabella smiled watching the familiar scene unfolding in front of her. The truth was that she had missed it, after so many months away from them and seeing each other only by casual video calls, it was nice to be all together even if the whole family was not yet there because her parents had traveled to Barcelona, where her next race was going to be, with her brother the previous week to celebrate the birthday of the youngest of the Torres family and now a week later her grandparents, her uncles, aunts and her cousins were still to arrive so that everyone could attend the race on Sunday because they wanted to support Arabella in their native country. But this was nice, she had missed hearing her brother's nonsense, her mother acting like a mother and talking about cars with her father. She missed a normal life that she had never had.

"By the way" Her father caught her attention, turned her gaze to him drinking from her glass full of sangria. She saw out of the corner of her eye how she pointed to the team of Netflix’s cameras that surrounded them in the garden of the house they had rented during their stay in Barcelona “Do we have to speak in English or...?”.

Marisa, her mother, let out an disgusted moan “Oh, with how much I struggle with English”.

The green-eyed boy laughed as he nibbled at the chicken wing that his fingers were holding “I still don't understand how you don't know English, mom. Your children are literally international athletes, you should know English”.

"I know English" The eyes of the same color as that of her two children opened in the direction of the teenager before she began to speak in English with a very strong Spanish accent "How are you? I'm fine, thank you!” She smiled with self-centeredness, pointed to herself “See? what your mother doesn't know how to do...”

“Jeez" The girl murmured, sticking her lips to the glass again while her brother burst into laughter, almost chocking with the wing.

The one wearing the glasses looked at his wife with a small smile, obviously trying to hid the laughter that was about to come out, and winked at her “Of course, honey! you are good at everything”.

Her brother's smile increased when their mother smiled sending a kiss to their father, clearly not grasping the intention of his words. Arabella shook her head but still a smile had made room in her full lips, she left the glass on the table and lay down on her chair after making a sandwich with the chorizos that her father had cooked on the barbecue.

"It's for the Netflix’s Formula One docuseries" She spoke with her mouth full, making her mother look at her badly but she didn't see her because she was looking at her father. She shrugged her shoulders turning her gaze to the sandwich before giving it another bite “They wanted to see what my private life is like and we speaks in Spanish so no. Speak in Spanish, period”.

"But your private life so fucking boring" She looked at her brother badly while her teeth crushed the food in her mouth, he stuck out his tongue at her.

"Oh, really? Okay, okay, I don't invite you to the party tonight then” She smiled evilly at what the moto driver let out a gasp bringing his hand to his chest.

"So rude, sister" He shook his head "So rude”.

A pleasant silence covered the table after her brother's words. Manuel, her father, shared smiles with his wife while they watched their children eat. They had also missed the family moments and were grateful to be together, especially after what their daughter had gone through thanks to the internet.

"Then will you go out tonight?" The man cleared his throat, turning his gaze to his firstborn, who nodded.

"It's been the boys' idea" She rolled her eyes “They've just arrived and they already want to party”.

"Don't you have the classification tomorrow?" She nodded to her brother's question and grimaced when she felt their mother's gaze on her.

"Arabella Torres González, don't even think about drinking tonight." She raised her finger and pointed at her accusively. The girl nodded while father and son looked at each other knowing that she was indeed going to drink. The blonde turned her gaze to her plate when she began to cut a piece of bacon “If you drink, don't drive”.

"I wasn't going to go drunk to practice, but well" She murmured, giving the last bite to the bread. She wiped his lips with the napkin that was next to her plate.

The only brown eyed let out a breath of air when the cold Coca Cola passed through his throat and smiled “Well, I think it's great that you go out, honey. Especially after everything that has happened”.

She nodded, offering a smile to her father before looking down at her plate, a common reaction she had to the mention of the twitter situation.

"Do you think you're going to win?" She heard her brother ask and although she thanked him mentally because she knew that he had changed the subject to entertain her, she couldn't help to, without knowing why, tense.

Being honest, she knew why: everyone's eyes would be on her, not only because it was going to be the first time she was going to race in her country since she in formula one, but because of the same issue she was trying to avoid. She had disappeared since what happened, the only time the media could see her was in the Azerbaijan race and they didn't even see her too much because she refrained from doing interviews or any kind of media in addition to the fact that she had moved away from social media even closing her twitter account temporarily after announcing on Instagram live that she was tired of the comments towards her body.

She had managed to hide well from the paparazzi and that had made people talk about, the whole gossip magazines was talking about her and not only them because even in the sports they had mentioned her situation which had caught the attention of many celebrities, especially women, who defended her from the internet trolls and praised her for continuing with her sportiness above all. Her popularity had risen like foam and the contracts and offers of all kinds of brands had not taken long to reach her manager's email. The first offer they had accepted had been to be the cover of the May issue of GQ Magazine where she had taken the opportunity to talk about how the online comments about her body had affected her, which was something quite healing for her, being able to talk loudly about it because she had been keeping it to herself.

Before she didn’t give too much importance to her body, focused since she was a child on cars and nothing else had not gone through that stage in which insecurities about her physique tormented her but that controversy had provoked it. She had suffered a mini crisis in which she was never very hungry, she spent hours looking at her reflection in the mirror thinking that it was what was wrong with her, her wardrobe had changed to a more comfortable and wide one that did not reveal more than the minimum of skin and the salt of her tears was the only thing that fed her.

She wasn't proud of herself, far from it, but what could you wait for? She was just an eighteen-year-old girl receiving hatred everywhere, although none of those people had a face to look at when she read those insults Arabella could not prevent them from affecting her. And although she was much better now, after talking to Sebastian –who was on a plane on his way to Spain, because unfortunately he hadn’t been able to attend Azerbaijan– as if he were her personal psychologist and spending time with her family, she could not help but tense every time something reminded her of the small trauma she had experienced.

She closed her eyes inhaling and exhaling "I have a good feeling but I don't want to jinx it”.

Her mother's hand curled up on hers, looked up to see her and immediately felt a warmth and security invade her body causing her to relax her tense shoulders. Marisa González smiled sweetly at her daughter "No matter what happens, we will be proud of you, cariño. Okay?”.

She bit her lower lip feeling her eyes begin to sting, she nodded "Okay" Her voice came out more raspy than usual, causing the woman to get up from her seat and approach her daughter to hug her.

"THIS is so awkward" A somewhat drunk Lando looked worriedly at his teammate while he rolled his eyes denying. He pushed his arm when he saw him “Carlos! What do we do? I can't keep this secret that is eating me alive”.

"It's not a secret because we don't know if it's true" He leaned over to take his glass from the small table in front of the sofa on which they were both sitting and drank from it.

He was going to need alcohol to survive the night.

He opened his eyes in an exaggerated and paranoid way “What do you mean, Carlos? Look at them, they look like cats in heat!” He extended both arms towards the dance floor where they could see Arabella dancing with Daniel and Pierre while Charles was next to George at the bar, neither of the two pending the presence of the other to the very opposite of what number 4 had said.

A "Mmh" sounded on the other side and they both quickly turned their heads to see the Dutchman sitting on the other sofa. The McLaren's idiots opened their eyes with surprise when they remembered that the Red Bull driver was with them.

"So, do you think Arabella and Charles are together?" He raised one of his eyebrows, curious because he swore to have seen things among the members of the red team but he had not yet mentioned his suspicions to anyone.

"Don't tell anyone, but yes”.

"It's not that we believe it, it's that we know it" The British raised his index finger to emphasize his words.

"Oh, really? How?” Max moved in his seat, approaching them to try to get information from them because he had decided not to drink that night so he was bored as he watched his friends and co-workers approach the ethyl coma.

The curly-haired one approached him too, looking over his shoulder to prevent unwanted ears from hearing their conversation “Have you seen how they look at each other? Or at least how Charles looks at her? She is more discreet but he is not and clearly that look is not from friends”.

"Mmm" The 33 rubbed his chin before a mischievous smile crept into his lips "Maybe we can make them confess”.

"Ohhhhh" Lando laughed while Carlos pursed his lips.

"I don't know, guys" He denied taking another sip from his glass "We shouldn't get in, I also think they're angry at each other”.

"Yes” Verstappen’s blue eyes moved to the spaniard "I've noticed it too, they're acting weird. They don't talk much”.

Norris let out a moan of protest while patting his thigh “Now that we have something to entertain ourselves, they go and break up”.

"Shut up, shut up!" The eldest of the three exclaimed between his teeth when he saw Pierre and Arabella approaching the VIP zone, the reflections of the lights colliding against the brightness of the girl's skirt almost blinded him "They're coming, they're coming”.

Pierre let go of the girl's hand and dropped with a sigh on the sofa next to Max, who looked at him raising both eyebrows making the Frenchman smile at him unwillingly “God, i’m dead”.

"But we barely have danced, P” The girl who was still standing laughed, Carlos moved making room for her but she denied leaning a hand on his shoulder. She made puppy eyes “Carlitos, you coming to dance with me”.

He shook his head without looking at her because he knew he was going to give in if he kept looking at her “No, no, I'm okay here”.

"Oh, come on!" She complained before taking his hand and began to pull him but it was of little use. Releasing a blow, she sat next to him and took the cup, earning a complaint from him “You are the only one with whom I can sing the songs, this useless frenchie doesn’t know the lyrics”.

"Sorry for not knowing Spanish!" The other exclaimed as he raised both arms "I already know English and Italian and that is more than enough”.

"Hey, what about Daniel?" The Dutchman frowned when he realized that his former teammate was not in the group.

"He found a girl" The girl shrugged her shoulders accepting the glass of the other spaniard when he took a sip and then hand in it to her again.

Immediately everyone let out complaints in unison and she laughed because she knew why. They had decided to ignore the hotels and rent a house all together to be able to stay a couple more days in the country and, well, they were going to have to listen to the australian and his fling all night.

"Can I sleep with you today?" Carlos looked at her horrified because he was the one who had his room next to Ricciardo's, she denied what he opened his mouth in pain "Why not?"

"Because you don't want to dance with me" She was busy arguing with him so she didn't notice when Max collided his knee with Lando's to get his attention, once the boy looked at him he nodded to the girl opening his eyes.

"What?" He asked in a confused whisper to what Max rolled his eyes and Pierre approached them, curious about what was happening.

"Go dance with her so we can make Charles jealous”.

"Why is Charles going to get jealous because Bella dances with Lando?" Pierre looked at them strangely, he was not surprised about a jealous Charles because, obviously, he had also realized the feelings of his friends, what he didn’t understand was why was he going to feel jealous of the little boy of the McLaren team.

A demonic smile was planted on the full lips of the much acclaimed lion “You'll see”.

With his gaze he pointed to the duo that was approaching them and Gasly nodded impatiently to see how the Dutchman's plan unfolded.

"Bells" The voice of the curly haired one came out high and both the 10 and the 33 had to put their hands to their mouths to avoid laughing. The girl looked at him expectantly but smiling, he swallowed saliva feeling nervous suddenly “I can dance with you, if you want”.

She nodded before getting up and extending her hand towards him, who didn't take long to take her between his much larger one and let himself be guided by her to the dance floor. Along the way they met Charles and George, his blueish green eyes collided with the greens of the Monegasque who clearly did not look very happy at the image in front of him. He swallowed again, praying mentally that the elder would not end up beating him up. The girl in front of him kept pulling him, completely ignoring her teammate but not without giving a smile to her other British friend who responded by raising both thumbs.

Fuck he thought when the reggaeton song of which he didn't know how to pronounce its name changed to Reminder by The Weeknd. A wave of screams filled his ears when the first chords filled the nightclub, he watched as the sweaty bodies stuck even more when he heard the song and suddenly he felt that the shirt that decorated his torso was too small for him. He hooked his index finger on the neck to relieve the sensation a little but it didn't work too much.

His eyes went down to the girl in front of him, despite wearing heels she was still shorter than him so he could see the club above her head. He bit the inside of his cheek when they finally found a clear space on the track and turned around to look at him.

She analyzed him from top to bottom before showing him a nice smile "If you want we can go back, Lan. It's okay”.

He immediately denied “No, no, it's fine. Let's dance, that's what we've come for, right?”.

"Okay, but if you feel uncomfortable, tell me" She stood on her tippy toes to reach his ear because Abel Tesfaye's voice was too loud. The boy closed his eyes when he smelled her perfume “Okay?”.

She separated from him, enough so that they could look at each other's face but not so that their bodies would stop being against each other. He nodded speechlessly looking into her eyes and she smiled funny before taking her hands and placing them on her hips to which the boy opened his eyes wide making her throw her head after laughing.

"They are just hips, Lando!"

"Yeah, i know, but... don't blame me" He laughed too.

On the other side of the nightclub, their friends watched them as if they were the best show in the world while Charles felt that he was going about to throw up. He squeezed his grip on the glass that was in his hands without looking away from the young drivers, who now danced very close to each other. It should be him who was there moving his body next to hers, it should be him who had his hands on her hips, it should be him who had his arms around her neck. It should be him and not Lando.

"They would make a good couple" He heard Sainz speak, who was looking at him out of the corner of his eye.

"I thought that if she would date with one of us it would be Max" All the eyes, including Charles's, went to George, who had not realized that he had become the center of attention because he was very distracted on his mission to catch with his straw a gummie that was at the bottom of his glass.

The named one frowned “With me?”.

Pierre moved in his seat offended "Yes, what do you mean with Max?" Why not with me?”.

The Spaniard laughed scratching his leg over the fabric of his jeans “Don't you have a girlfriend?”.

"Shut up, Carlos. This is important” The Frenchman raised his hand trying to block the Spanish's face.

Russell's bulging eyes rose to look at his colleagues “I mean... I don't know, between Max and Bella there is like this strange tension but at the same time they get along well. I guess it will be because they are both so focused about beating Hamilton but I thought they would end up together”.

The green eyes of the number 16 traveled to his childhood rival, his desire to throw up became even stronger when he saw that he was struggling not to let out a smile. He knew that he had liked the British's words and although he couldn’t blame him because, to be honest, they were all young men and she was practically a goddess so he was not too surprised that he was not the only one interested in her.

"Mmmh" Pierre's lips furrowed in agreement. "Yeah, they wouldn't look bad together. It would be kind of enemies on the track to lovers off the track, it would make sense”.

Russell pointed it at him “Right?”.

"But she and Lando have already kissed" After Verstappen's words, everyone looked at him strangely.

Carlos let out a high-pitched squeal “It was you who interrupted them!”.

"Yes" He laughed nodding as he drank from his glass, he moved his gaze towards the boy sitting next to him.

"Well, Landito has a lot of advantage then" Carlos' honey eyes returned to the dance floor causing the others to imitate him. The youngest pair of the group were dancing as close as they could to each other, they were sure that not even a pen could fit between them, Arabella was with her back to him with her arms hanging from his neck while Lando hid her face in her neck and his hands kept a firm grip on the girl's waist.

"Do you think they will fuck tonight?" The dirty blond with a beard smiled like a kid, entertained by the reaction of his best friend but also happy that his friends got some kind of action.

"Looks like it”.

Before Max's words, he squeezed the glass so much that it exploded, attracting the attention of others and even of some people around them. He felt the cold liquid from his cup pierce the fabric of his pants when he released the last piece of glass that he was still holding in his hands. He waved his hand to get rid of the liquid and let Carlos take it to inspect that no crystal had been stuck in his skin.

"Fuck, Leclerc" The one with the raspy voice handed him napkins from the napkin holder that was on the low table in the center of the sofas.

He looked back at the dance floor ignoring how Carlos called a waitress or how Pierre and Max tried to clean the mess by throwing an unnecessary amount of napkins on the floor. Suddenly he was relieved when he saw the dark-haired British boy walking towards the table, with no trace of the brunette next to him.

"What happened?" Lando's disheveled eyebrows came together when he saw his friends trying to clean the floor and Charles soaked from top to bottom.

The monegasque had to look away from the boy when he noticed a mark of lipstick of the same color as the one Arabella wore on his cheek. He got up abruptly releasing a quick "I'm going to the bathroom" before leaving.

He walked through the club as if the devil himself was behind him, he ignored the screams of the people when the song changed and also the looks of the Spanish girls on him in addition to their whispers. Once he reached the hallway where the bathroom was, he let out a sigh, his knuckles had turned white from how hard he was squeezing his fists. He leaned against the wall taking advantage of the fact that the hallway was empty and sighed, bringing a hand to his hair.

Damn the day he met Arabella Torres. Since that day, everything that could have gone wrong was going wrong. He didn't blame her but the damn fate for playing with him that way.

He leaned his head on the wall, looking at the ceiling and thought that it wasn’t as he had expected the night to be. He had gone to the party hoping to be able to talk to her and fix their problems but no, she hadn’t even give a single look to him and that drove him crazy because since their fight and having left him lying in her driver’s room they hadn’t spoken, except for some video that the Ferrari stuff had forced them to record for the YouTube channel and little else. They hadn't even seen each other since the last race, they were supposed to have flown together from Azerbaijan to Barcelona but Arabella had run away to Madrid to celebrate her brother's birthday with her family so it had been almost two weeks since they had last seen each other.

For a moment he wondered what his life would have been like if maybe they were in different teams or if they were normal people and met at a party like this or maybe at college. Everything would have been very different and much easier.

He moved his head following the rhythm of the song without knowing that the lyrics said because it was in spanish and sighed when he heard the door of one of the bathrooms open, he looked down even without separating his head from the wall.

Oh, what a coincidence.

"What happened to your pants?" Arabella was in front of him, looking with a frown at the dark spot that covered much of the fabric that covered his leg.

"My glass exploded" He replied in a hoarse voice because he had not said a word almost all night. He observed her through his long eyelashes, trying to memorize the image in front of him before she ignored him again.

"Ah, good luck cleaning that then" She squeezed her lips and began to turn, ready to get out of there, to run away from him again but he prevented her by grabbing her wrist. She froze in his place, she had missed his touch, she let out a sigh trying to stay calm “Charles, let me go”.

"Why?" A cynical smile stood on his lips "Are you in a hurry to go back to Lando?".

He saw how she tilted her head to the side before she let go of his grip and turned around, he saw how she looked at him confused.

“What does Lando have to do with this?”.

"I've seen how he was kissing your neck and how you danced very close. Too close to be just friends" Everything around Charles was red, as red as the cars they drove or the uniforms they wore on weekends. He was jealous and drunk and didn't think too clearly because they both knew that he wasn't like that. Arabella looked at him strangely, she never seen him that way “What, have you already found my replacement?”.

"What the fuck?" She murmured in spanish. The girl was surprised and as incredible as it may seem, turned on.

"Maybe you can go to McLaren" He bowed his head as his gaze went from her eyes to his lips "But you know that orange will never look as good as red on you”.

She immediately realized that it was a metaphor and wanted to laugh but was too confused to do so. The alcohol in her system next to Charles' perfume wasn't really helpful. She knew that he was playing a game and that if she followed it she could get burned but everyone knew that Arabella Torres was reckless and that she liked danger.

Her confused expression changed, Charles couldn’t describe it but when she began to shorten the distance between them he began to walk backwards, unconsciously entering the women's bathroom, which was empty thank God. He felt his mouth dry when he saw that the girl's hand went to her chest where she began to play with the buttons of the shirt she was wearing “I'm not sure if the red fits me so well” Slow but very slowly she unbuttoned the first buttons revealing a red lace bra. She gathered his eyebrows looking at him with feigned curiosity and in an innocent tone asked him "What do you think?"

He blinked a couple of times before looking up at her. He cursed in French before shortening the distance and smashing his lips against hers. He passed his hand through his neck entangled his fingers between the soft waves of brown hair, closed his fist and pulled her hair forcing her to walk towards the sink. Her ass hit the edge of the marble board making her moan in his mouth because his free hand was squeezing her butt making the Prada's skirt rise and she could feel the cold marble against her skin. The moan in his mouth made him smile, his hands moving from top to bottom through her body caressing her barely covered skin thanks to the open shirt and the short skirt.

Her hands traveled to the boy's neck, one of them taking over the small strands that were born on the back of his neck causing Charles to open his lips but not move them, he stayed in his place watching as she twisted under his touch, the smug smile he had on his lips made her know that he was enjoying it. The tips of his bangs stuck to her skin thanks to the thin space between their foreheads tickling her, which was making her nervous.

Arabella let out a small moan when she felt his right hand go up from her ass to her naked thigh and go through the bottom of her skirt to her underwear. He kissed her again as he pressed with his finger –she wouldn’t know which one– against the fine red lace garment that separated her skin from the contact of his hand.

For a second she thought that she had reached glory when she felt how he was pressing even harder but she fell from the cloud when he separated. She looked at him frowning at what he gave her a smile of apology before asking her with his eyes if she was okay and comfortable with that.

At another time maybe she would have thought it was cute but she was drunk and horny so she could only roll her eyes and take his hand with hers to place it back on her panties “For God's sake, Charles. Just do it”.

This time it was she who joined their lips, ran her fingers through his hair and pressed herself as hard as she could against him while their tongues fought each other. She let herself be embraced by his pleasant smell and the thousand sensations she felt when he was like this with her.

She released her grip on his hair and took her hands along a path from his neck to his chest where she took the shirt in her fists and, in one movement, pulled it breaking the buttons making them fly. He walked away from her when he heard the buttons touch the ground, he looked at them without expression before turning his gaze towards her, raising an eyebrow looking at her between his eyelashes. She bit her lip because, let's be honest, he looked too good looking at her like that from that angle.

"I'll buy you a new one" She went to tell him, but before she opened her mouth, he screwed his hands on the back of her thighs, causing her to let out a small choked scream in surprise when she didn't feel the ground under her feet.

She hissed when the cold of the marble hit the skin of her thighs although she was silent when she felt Charles' hands raise her skirt more to have better access between her legs. The monegasque released the garment when he felt her gaze on him, he looked at her without raising his face, giving a dark touch to his gaze. They watched each other in silence for a few seconds until Charles took his right hand to her jaw and kissed her quickly, separated from her but not enough so that their breaths didn’t mix and took his fingers to her lips.

"Open your mouth" He murmured still holding her gaze, the girl obeyed by letting his fingers pass between her lips meanwhile he looked down at her mouth “Suck”.

He watched with delight as the girl's swollen lips closed around his digits, he felt her tongue playing with them. He looked into her eyes and found that she was already looking at him and almost moaned at that moment.

"Merde, mon ange" He cursed when she let go of his fingers making a pop resonate through the empty bathroom. Shit, my angel.

"Charles..." She said his name in a sigh. He looked at her expectantly with his fingers still touching her lips, the skin of her mouth stained by the red lipstick collided with his finger tips surely staining them too “Charles, please”.

"Please, what?" His voice came out in a murmur but she still heard him and of course she did because the only thing she could hear, feel and smell was him. She was drunk but the alcohol wasn’t what the room had circling around her but him.

She hated Charles Leclerc, she hated the effect he had on her, she hated that even though she was angry with him she felt the stupid need to feel his skin against hers, she hated that they couldn’t be together, she hated that he was playing with her that way, she hated that it made her question every damn aspect of his life. She hated him.

Damn Leclerc and his perfect eyes.

She squeezed her grip on his shirt and kissed the fingers that hadn’t yet separated from her lips before looking at him through her long eyelashes with the most pleading look she could give him "I need you. Please”.

Pathetic, she thought for a moment but the boy's hands rolling up on the fabric that covered her private parts returned her to reality or at least to that bubble in which they had both locked themselves. She rested her hands on the white marble countertop and raised her hips to help him slide the garment down her legs before he made a gap between them and kissed her abruptly.

She felt how the tips of his fingers caressed the inside of her thighs until he reached his destination. She felt how they grazed her folds, covering them with her juices and she groaned in his mouth when she felt him slowly rubbing her clit.

The boy broke the kiss by grabbing her neck when she saw that she made the move of throwing her head back “Was that what you wanted?” His voice was so calm, in contrast to how trembling her breathing was “Did you want my fingers, mmh?”.

"Please" She groaned and he pressed his fingers harder.

She let out a gasp when his fingers slightly touched her entrance, pushed her hips against his hand desperate for his touch, that caused him to laugh. He put one of his fingers inside and a soft moan came out of her, hips moving again to look for some kind of liberation “More” She complained in a murmur under the intense gaze of the boy.

"More?" He smiled and inserted another finger, feeling the walls tighten around his fingers, his hand moving to equalize the movements of her hips, putting in and pulling out his finger being able to hear the wet sounds.

The whining and moans began to get stronger, the nails stuck strongly in the skin of his shoulder on the fabric of his shirt and he moaned at the sensation, looking at her as he fucked her with his fingers.

Arabella thought that not only did his fingers feel incredible, but he also looked so good in front of her and just by looking at him touching her she thought he could send her to the limit. His thumb went up to rub her clit causing her to sink her teeth into her lower lip, the sensation became too intense.

"I'm so c-close" She groaned and he straightened up, crashing his lips in hers, their tongues dancing in a passionate kiss while his fingers pushed into her faster and deeper. The fluids ran through his hand while his thumb applied even more pressure. She felt so overwhelmed that she couldn't even keep up with the kiss, she was too focused on how well her fingers felt inside her.

And just when she began to feel those tickles in her lower belly that she had rarely felt in her life, everything stopped making her open her eyes abruptly. She looked at the boy in front of her confused and moaned when she felt how her disconnected their bodies.

“Charles...”.

His free hand squeezed on the back of her neck, he approached her ear and she heard how he smiled, "You're right, red doesn't look that good on you.

He walked away from her causing a sudden feeling of being cold to cover her body, she frowned when he saw him crouch and take her thong from the floor. With a mocking smile he shook it before storing it in the pocket of his pants “I'll keep this, maybe it will bring me good luck and I beat you in your home race. See you, mon ange”.

He winked at her, causing his dimples to be marked on his face. She looked at him, her eyes shining thanks to the tears of frustration that had accumulated. She clenched her jaw watching how he was leaving the bathroom so calmly. She looked silently for a couple of seconds at the door through which he had disappeared before releasing a scream of rage. She swallowed between quick breaths and closed her eyes, dropping her head against the cold mirror.

"Fucking asshole”.

𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗯𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗮_𝘁𝟵 added to their story!

A mischievous smile was present Charles' face, who was looking at the photos that Arabella had uploaded. He looked up from his phone when he heard footsteps enter his part of the garage, he saw one of his teammate's engineers approach his car to talk to his own engineers. He ignored him and looked back at the device in his hands, trying to hide his deception when he saw that it wasn't the brunette.

But when a part of the conversation made its way to him he couldn't help but turn his attention to them. He continued looking at the phone and moving his thumb across the screen from time to time to disguise it.

"I recommend that you don't talk to Arabella today" Said the man whose name Charles didn't know. He had seen him several times in the other part of the Ferrari garage but the truth was that he had never paid much attention to Arabella's team. His ears perked up at the girl's name.

“Why?” His engineers were clearly not as interested as Charles as they didn't even give him a second glance and continued inspecting the car.

"Just don't say anything to her unless she talks to you first".

And with that he ran to the other end of the red walls. He frowned and got up from his seat, left the garage belonging to his team and began to walk towards McLaren's, ready to find Carlos because he knew on good authority that the spaniard was the one who kept the paddock's princess' secrets.

He laughed to himself wondering if she had told him what happened in the bathroom at the nightclub last night. He hesitated because she told him everything but he wasn't so sure if she would tell him that.

I'll find it out now, he thought as he saw the spaniard sitting on the ground with several others. He clenched his jaw at the sight of the other part of the McLaren duo but continued his pace towards them anyway.

"Haven't you noticed that she's acting strange?" The Australian's notable nose wrinkled at his own question. He narrowed his eyes.

"Yeah? No, I don't know" Alex raised his head looking at the others confused "I mean, I don't know her as well as you do but there is something different about her".

"Maybe she's just focused on trying to win in her homerace" His best friend shrugged, turning his head to look at the other side of the paddock. He raised both eyebrows when he saw him and was immediately excited "Charles is his teammate, surely he can tell us what is happening to our girl".

He looked down at him, his expression showing very clearly that he had not liked the way he had referred to the spanish woman. Gasly's annoyed smile widened as he separated the green from the blue and shook his head.

"We argued so she doesn't talk to me" He put his hands on both hips and rested his weight on one leg. He looked at Carlos surreptitiously trying to see some kind of expression that would give away that he knew about their relationship but nothing. On the one hand he felt relieved, on the other he felt the need to talk to someone about it but he knew it was too big a risk.

He felt Ricciardo's hand collide with his shoulder and then his contagious laughter filled his ears "Have you never heard the expression "happy woman, happy garage"?.

"What have you done now?".

He looked at Albon, putting a hand to his chest, offended “Why does it have to be me?”.

"She's the one who doesn't talk to you, the one who must have screwed up must have been you" Carlos joined his hands on top of his knees, his eyes focused on some distant point behind Charles' body.

He opened his mouth to complain but the vpice of the protagonist's of the conversation made everyone look in the same direction that Carlos had his eyes on. The girl walked through the paddock alongside a group of cameras and interviewers, answering her questions with her calm even though the press seemed to be about to kill each other to be able to walk near her. As if she were some kind of saint who just by being close to her and breathing her air would cure most horrible symptoms.

Lando broke the silence that had formed between them by speaking for the first time since the monegasque had joined them “They have never fought to interview me.”

"Me neither".

"Neither" Daniel responded and Alex just clicked his tongue.

He curled his lips and then remembered that in the other two races she hadn't done any kind of press. Charles didn't know why but it wasn't like he could ask her either. He watched her walk away and twisted his head, something was happening here.

"POLE position, baby!" Alexandre exclaimed in her ears and she laughed at the man's enthusiasm. As always before getting out of the car, she thanked the team over the radio and took off her helmet followed by her balaclava. She heard the roar of the Mercedes and watched as Hamilton's car parked next to hers, she saw him get out of her and copy her, taking off his helmet and balaclava. He looked at her and smiled at her raising both eyebrows to which she rolled her eyes and started walking away.

“Why are you avoiding me?” The British accent sounded soft and sweet next to her. She looked at him out of the corner of her eye seeing that he had not taken long to get next to her. She tightened her grip on her helmet.

"Because I don't want to see you" She smiled sarcastically still looking ahead. Lewis frowned and quickened his pace to stand in front of her, walking backwards. He observed her face delighting in it when he saw her make a face of frustration when she saw him in front of her "You're going to fall".

A smile planted itself on his plump lips “Aw, you care about me.”

"On the contrary, it would brighten my day" Sarcasm continued decorating her pretty smile.

"I thought me being second was what would make your day" He stopped his pace abruptly, causing her to collide with him, she placed her hands on his hard chest to avoid stepping on him and grunted in annoyance while the british man smiled, clearly enjoying the moment.

As if he were poison, she quickly let go. She looked up to see him, remaining silent for a few seconds because she didn't know they were so close to each other. She blinked before pushing him away, his annoying laughter soon filling her ears “Enjoy the views from the second place.”

The man laughed again watching her walk away from him towards her garage, her car being driven by one of the engineers following her at a considerable speed. He sank her teeth into his bottom lip before raising his voice“I'll do it! Believe me, I will".

She hurried into the garage, clenching her jaw as she saw the monegasque driver giving her a smile as if nothing had happened between them "Congratulations…"

She raised a hand blocking his face and his words before passing by him and heading to the hallway that would take her to her room, ignoring how the red polo shirts were soaked with champagne and how everyone was celebrating the pole position. Upon arrival she dropped the helmet on the ground without giving much importance to the loud noise it made when it hit the ground and threw herself onto the sofa while releasing a sigh. She closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.

"ARABELLA TORRES CROSSES THE STARTING LINE CROWNED AS THE NEW WORLD CHAMPION!"

Despite the roar of the car engine and the cloaks covering her ears she could hear the screams of the audience. She frowned when she saw a sea of red and yellow flags, her team began to take their place on the fence that separated the track from the pedestrian zone, she saw how they shouted with smiles on their faces and how they waved their flag in the air and then she knew.

She had won.

She had won the last race of the season and just like that the fucking title of world champion was hers.

She laughed madly, raising her arm above the halo in celebration. She pressed the button on the radio and incredulously asked "Have I won?".

"YOU'RE WORLD CHAMPION, BABY!—She heard Susie's scream, behind the blonde's voice she could hear the others celebrating the victory. Her smile widened even more making her cheeks start to hurt. Wolff wiped her own tears and picked up the microphone, bringing it to her lips. "You've won, Arabella. You've done".

Her lips trembled but the smile didn't fade, her throat went dry and for a moment she saw blurred "Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you so much to all of you, guys."

Come on, get out of the car so we can celebrate" This time it was Toto's voice that rang through her ears, he nodded and followed the few meters of road until she reached the sign with the number one. She parked in it and sighed before getting up from her seat and raising both arms in victory.

She got out of the car feeling tears begin to roll down her cheeks. She took off her helmet and balaclava before kneeling on the ground right in front of the car, clasping her hands together and resting them against the nose of the black car and then resting her forehead on her hands, as if she were praying to the machine. She lowered her head until her forehead was almost touching the floor and, finally, she cried. She let out a sob so hard her chest hurt, and she grabbed the fabric of the chest of her suit tightly.

"Arabella, Arabella, Arabella!" For a moment she heard nothing but the audience chanting her name.

She sobbed again, raising her head, looking around around. Everything seemed to go in slow motion. Was that really happening? She looked at the camera in front of her and with her hand on rop of her heart chehe vocalized several "Thank you" non-stop.

Suddenly she heard a loud bang and immediately afterward the screams of people, she looked at her hands and frowned when she saw that they were illuminated by an orange light.

She raised her head slowly seeing how her car was on fire, she moved her gaze to the right finding the red car embedded in the side of hers. She watched in horror as Charles's lifeless eyes looked back at her.

“Arabella, Arabella, Arabella!” The crowd's cries grew even louder and she willed them to shut up. She got up to run towards Charles but it was too late, neither he nor both cars nor even the circuit were there.

“Arabella, wake up” Some light pushes drew her to reality, with a gasp she opened her eyes, meeting Sebastian's face.

She smiled when she saw him and wrapped her arms around his neck. She heard his laugh and felt how he gave a kiss on her hair before caressing it.

"I'm here, siéger” He whispered into her ear, his voice immediately bringing him peace. She sighed against his shoulder “I'm here.” Champion.

"God, I've missed you so much" She murmured against his jacket, she hid her face even more in his neck, feeling the man's hand go up and down her back.

“Me too, siéger” He patted her on the back a couple of times and began to let her go. He looked at her with a frown “Were you having a nightmare?”

“Yeah, but…wait” Her gaze ran to rest on the clock on the wall right next to the television. She opened her eyes in surprise before looking at the man kneeling in front of her "Is it Sunday already?".

Vettel nodded “Yes, you've been sleeping here since qualifying. It's been a long nap”.

She put her head in her hands, hiding her face in them, and let out a sigh “I didn't sleep much yesterday.”

“How much?”.

She denied, remembering that when she arrived at the villa that the boys had rented she couldn't sleep but instead stayed tossing and turning in bed all night without stopping thinking about the race and how frustrated the green-eyed boy had left her. Plus Carlos's unconscious body trying to hug her every chance she got didn't help her much “An hour”.

“Fuck, siéger” He let out an incredulous laugh “And yet you qualified on pole, incredible”.

She shrugged as if it was nothing. She turned her neck to both sides grimacing when she heard the bones creak and got up from the couch being followed by the german, who stepped forward to open the door for her.

They walked among the paddock, heading to the common cafeteria so the girl could have breakfast. They both ignored the surprised looks at seeing the former champion walk and chat so calmly next to the driver, since it was not public knowledge that she and Sebastian Vettel had known each other and had maintained a friendship since she was a child. She licked her lips watching the cameras not far from them, she knew that at any moment people were going to find out so she tried not to give it much importance while the dark blonde, on the other hand, looked a little worried.

Sebastian knew that the girl didn’t want the public to know about her friendship, either the one she had with him or with the Schumachers, since the public would quickly question all of her achievements in her career. Both Sebastian and Mick understood and agreed with her, they knew Michael would agree too. And that's how it had been since they met, distancing herself from the Schumacher’s son while they were in public when they met at a race even though they both wanted to talk or simply enjoy each other's company, not being able to go to Sebastian's races to support him or couldn't even talk about how the germans had become fundamental supports in her life since she met them at the tender age of eleven.

That's why he couldn't help but be surprised when he accepted her call and heard her invite him to the next race. He looked at her out of the corner of his eye, he knew that she had had a bad time and he was worried about her, after all for him, she was like his eldest daughter. Not for nothing did his first-born daughter bear her name.

Once seated in the cafeteria, they were accompanied by the girl's manager and her publicist, who after waiting for her to have breakfast, dragged her away because she had to do some interviews.

“Don't you notice something strange on her?” Nicholas took a bite of his croissant, both men watching the two women walk away at a hasty pace.

“There is something in her gaze” He responded, nodding “Something that I don't know if I like”.

He had noticed it and it had not been difficult for him to recognize that shine in her eyes. He more than anyone could know it, because a while ago he also had that shine in his own eyes.

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thelibraryghost · 10 days

Text

A Young Person's Guide to 18th-Century Western Fashion

unabridged version at blogspot

General info Cox, Abby. "I Wore 18th-Century Clothing *Every Day for 5 YEARS & This Is What I Learned (Corsets Aren't Bad!)." YouTube. May 10, 2020. Cullen, Oriole. “Eighteenth-Century European Dress.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2004. Glasscock, Jessica. "Eighteenth-Century Silhouette and Support." In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2004. Accessories Banner, Bernadette. "Women's Pockets Weren't Always a Complete Disgrace | A Brief History: England, 15th c - 21st c." YouTube. April 10, 2021. Colonial Williamsburg. "#TradesTuesday: Men's Accessories." YouTube. June 13, 2021. Murden, Sarah. "The Georgian era fashion for straw hats." All Things Georgian. December 6, 2018. Cosmetics & hygiene Cox, Abby. "I Followed an 18th-Century Moisturizer & Sunscreen Recipe & it kinda worked??." YouTube. February 21, 2021. Cox, Abby. "We tried making *5* different 250 year old rouge (blush) recipes || [real] regencycore makeup." YouTube. August 29, 2021. JYF Museums. "Hygiene in the 18th Century | From the Farm to the Army." YouTube. August 21, 2021. Décor Heckscher, Morrison H. “American Rococo.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2003. Munger, Jeffrey. “French Porcelain in the Eighteenth Century.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2003. Formal wear SnappyDragon. "This dressing gown changed fashion forever : the feminist history of going out in loungewear." YouTube. April 15, 2022. Stowell, Lauren. "The Many Types of 18th Century Gowns." American Duchess. March 15, 2013. Zebrowska, Karolina. "Cottagecore Style Is Much Older Than You Think." YouTube. June 30, 2021. Hair care Cox, Abby. "I made 250-year-old Hair Products Using Original Recipes (and animal fat...)." YouTube. November 7, 2021. Cox, Abby. "I tried a 300-year-old hair care routine for a year & this is what I learned (it's awesome!)." YouTube. January 23, 2022. Cox, Abby. "What's the Deal with 18th Century Wigs? (and why Bridgerton really messed this up)." YouTube. June 1, 2023. Laundry Cox, Abby. "Making 300 Year Old SLIME for Laundry Day." YouTube. June 15, 2023. Townsends. "Historical Laundry Part 2: No Washing Machine, No Dryer, Hit It With A Stick?" YouTube. June 3, 2019. Outer- & working-wear JYF Museum. "Getting Dressed | Clothing for an 18th Century Middling Woman." YouTube. March 18, 2021. Major, Joanne. "The practicalities of wearing riding habits, and riding ‘en cavalier’." All Things Georgian. March 12, 2019. Rudolph, Nicole. "What did Pirates ACTUALLY Wear? Fashion at Sea in the 18th c & Our Flag Means Death Costumes." YouTube. May 8, 2022. Shoes Chin, Cynthia E. "Martha Washington's Shoes." George Washington's Mount Vernon. No date. Murden, Sarah. "18th-century shoes." All Things Georgian. December 15, 2015. Rudolph, Nicole. "Real 18th century Shoes? Historical Shoemaker Examines an Antique." YouTube. December 13, 2020. Textiles Cox, Abby. "18th Century Printed Cotton Do's & Don't's." American Duchess. December 23, 2019. Stowell, Lauren. "Fabrics for the 18th Century and Beyond." American Duchess. June 14, 2021. Townsends. "Oil Cloth - Waterproof Coverings for Your Campsite." YouTube. July 30, 2018. Undergarments Major, Joanne. "Quilted Petticoats: worn by all women and useful in more ways than one." All Things Georgian. November 20, 2018. Rudolph, Nicole. "Making 18th century Stays for the Ideal Body Shape : Historical Undergarments." YouTube. August 12, 2023. SnappyDragon. "RUMP ROAST : Ranking historical fashion's wildest fake butt pads." YouTube. October 27, 2023. Townsends. "Sewing Histories' Most Popular Garment - The Fabric Of History - Townsends." YouTube. September 3, 2022.

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blissfulphilospher · 9 days

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So, I don't know why I am posting this but I had this in my heart since a long time. So, bear with me.

I read Princess and the Queen and Fire and Blood back in 2019, after GoT ended for more content. And I got to know about The Dance from Tumblr, the awesome artists and fanarts.

When I read those books, I felt for Rhaenyra. No I don't have a step mother but Rhaenyra felt alone, like her mother died and her father remarried, her new step mom was first kind and loving but then after a brother all that changed.

I can't blame book Rhaenyra for not having good relationship with her siblings, she was a child, just like them and the world was trying to replace her with them just as her mother had been replaced. (When my brother was born, I felt the same and we don't have the best relationship even now, but you know whose fault is that? Adults. Adults who love to compare and pity siblings against siblings)

Why Viserys never tried to mend the relationship between his eldest son and daughter? Even Alicent tried. And then Daemon evidently manipulated Rhaenyra more to hate her siblings for his own benefit. He was pushed down in succession. (He should never have been in succession)

Then Rhaenyra grows older, bold and doing as she like, fighting her step mother, beefing with her siblings and people are following her. She is being courted and has freedom in that era.

I liked book Rhaenyra because she seemed ruthless. She wasn't trying to pretend being good, she was ambitious, she was fighting for the throne because her father chose her. Not because of a stupid prophecy. We all know how that ended. She wanted the throne. (I will eat my brother alive if my father chose me for something and not him). She was unhinged.

And I liked that about her. I liked Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen. She was greatly flawed, she offered her brothers for Laenor, she fed a man to her dragon, she hosted a lavish feast in a starving city, she was a woman and let men do the fighting. She was a mother and did everything to protect her children (foolishly though). She faced death with bravery and didn't begged and didn't offered negotiation, didn't ran. A true dragon. Like those menacing cruel dragons?

And then HotD gave us...

1) 'I rather serve as a knight and ride to battle and glory' but she isn't train with swords. If she wants that then why isn't she trained? Was this to appease Arya's fans? Also this message of feminism, 'a woman only cool and worth something when she wants to be like men, Do what men does.' I am not saying this is bad but you are making her a feminist atleast let her appreciate females? Also, again, if she wanted to train with swords then why didn't she? Nobody stopped Visenya and Alyssa, no one would have stopped her.

2) On Aegon's nameday, enough people have said that already, Rhaenyra being mean to her two year old brother and acting like a spoilt child but I want to add this—

Everyone came there for Aegon, hoping Viserys will name him heir. HotD gave us Rhaenyra acting like a brat and then killing a boar and totally projecting her as a protagonist by showing White Hart, and sexy cool asf covered with blood. She could have made alliance, like book Rhaenyra would have mingled with everyone, dressed better than everyone, charming everyone. Not arguing with other ladies and lords.

3) Daemyra. Enough said. I never thought Book Rhaenyra and Book Daemon had any great love story, they were not even written as such. Nah, Rhaenyra desired Criston, tried to seduce him first. Daemon was only using her. He had one healthy relationship in the book and that was with Laena. They both came together because none of them considered Alicent and her children as their family too.

I hate this show for promoting them as some great tragic love. Nah, Rhaenyra needed his protection and Daemon wanted to be closer to the throne. Why didn't they let them be that? How are they going to justify as to why Daemon left Rhaenyra and his son alone to go die along with Aemond?

And if Daemyra is a great tragic love story why they got afraid to show Rhaenyra having Laenor murdered? Because that was the level of her craziness in the books, and that's in the character of Daemyra. That's 'I will do anything to be with you, for you' energy.

Gods, I thought Rhaenyra would be Cersei Lannister level in HotD, cool, snarky, awesome, beautiful, unhinged, fashion icon, doing everything for her children, doing everything for her and not shying away from the person she is, a necessary evil (like feeding Vaemond to Syrax). And incestuous. Of course Jaime x Cersei level of craziness in Daemyra?

In HotD... Emma and Milly did awesome job but their character was bland. Served to us by writers as 'a goody two shoes always right'. 'she can do nothing wrong.'

Why is media afraid of showing what women are? Why can we only be 'goody two shoes, patriarchy bad, I am awesome cause I am not like other girls' in feminist shows? Why can't they women as humans, as grey, ambitious? Why can't woman be anti hero? Rhaenyra is suffering from stereotyped blend of Arya and Dany.

Alicent is a fresh breath in that regard. But I hate the show for stripping away her agency and making her a crybaby. You are showing me that the Queen, who may or not have murdered Viserys, cried for him? That her, who plotted and plotted and led the Greens, crowned her daughter would not want her son to be king?

They even changed the dinner scene, everyone was supposed to make fun of the other party. No heartwarming and Aegon was supposed to fight Jace.

But make two female characters cry over each other, cry over men, abuse them, strip their agency, make the person you are trying to show as protag (she should not even be a protag) blander than water and call it a feminist show.

(HotD should not even be a feminist show, it should have been a family drama show. Imagine my embarrassment when I told my brother that I love Rhaenyra and I am just like her before the show started and by the end I was like ... Wow Aegon Second of His Name, I stan the One True King. Because he, despite they made him a monster is more interesting than Rhaenyra at this point.)

I was robbed. We were robbed of spicy hot pizza and instead given a bland cheese toast.

I refuse to eat bread, give me cake. Cersei, Margaery, Catelyn were cake, Alicent... She is the cookie. (Not adding Sansa because in the end of the show... Book Sansa is pastry.)

At this moment we all most cope. Thank you whoever read this. Also wanted to add, I was Team Woman but I can't stan this Rhaenyra. Nah.

#alicent hightower #rhaenyra targaryen #fire and blood #cersei lannister #anti hotd #book rhaenyra #anti hotd Rhaenyra #this is not feminism #team green #anti daemyra #anti team black

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chaotic-archaeologist · 9 months

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got a question for ya regarding sex and online safety.

Background; I am an adulty adult. I have been able to and have voted in more than 3 elections. [I know you take interactions with minors seriously]. I am also ace and autistic. as a result I have never felt the urge to date and I normally don't mind having friends close by.

However, I also just moved for the 4th time since 2019 and would like to meet people.

So I downloaded Grindr. already got my first dickpic lol. I have also been chatting with a fellow who I like and would like to be friends with and I also wouldn't mind exploring my kinks with people... but I have never had to worry about safe online sexy stuff before so I don't know the basics beyond normal internet safety.

What do I do‽‽‽

Okay first, thanks for clarifying the adulty part. This is an awesome question, and here's the advice/steps that I personally follow for situations like this.

Have your first meeting in a public place. Go for coffee or ice cream or lunch or dinner or whatever. But don't meet them alone. This way, if you get uncomfortable with anything that's happening, they're much less likely to continue with that behavior after you attempt to extricate yourself.

Make sure there are no expectations. Plan not to have sex on the first date/meet up. Grindr often tends to ignore this rule since it's very hookup centric, but you're absolutely within your rights to insist on taking things as slowly as you want to.

Don't rely on the other person for transportation. If you choose to meet someone, get yourself there and plan to get yourself back. Walk, bike, drive, public transportation, unicycle, it's all good. But there's much less room for pressure if you're not depending on them for a ride home. This segues nicely into my next point:

Do not tell them where you live. At least, not right now. Plenty of people on Grindr are willing to "host" meaning you can come to their place. That's fine for them, but I err on the side of never giving anyone my address until I've had a thorough chance to assess their character and meet them a few times.

Tell someone where you will be. Let someone who cares about you know that you're going out, where you'll be, and what time you expect to return. Establish a time to check in when you're going home/if you choose to extend the meeting. There are also apps like Noonlight that can function similarly.

Be careful about what you consume. If you're going to enjoy and mind alternating substances, be very, very careful. This goes for anything from getting drinks at a bar to any and all of the recreational drugs on the market.

Be prepared for a little bit of awkwardness. Meeting someone in person is often very different than chatting online. If the conversation is awkward or halting, that's okay. Give it a little time (but also don't be afraid to trust your gut if it's telling you something is wrong).

Communicate clearly. If you have any needs—which can range from an allergy, not being able to stand for long periods of time, needing them to speak loudly so you can hear them, safety concerns—the best way to get those met is to be upfront. You don't need to disclose the reason why you need something if it makes you uncomfortable, just state what you need. People worth spending time with will respect that. The same thing goes for your wants.

Use protection. Maybe this isn't applicable for you specifically, but I think it belongs on this list. Condoms. Dental dams. Gloves. Someone on an app telling you they're negative for any number of things is not an actual guarantee they're not lying to you. Not wanting to use protection (not just for anal/vaginal intercourse, but for oral sex as well) is a huge red flag. Decide in advance what your boundaries are and stick to them.

If it sucks, hit da bricks. Fundamentally, you owe this person nothing. There is no consequence for saying "you know what, I'm not feeling this and I'm going to leave." Be as polite as you want to, but put yourself first.

At the end of the day, the only thing you have control over is you. How you react, where you meet this person, what you do—that's what you control. Hopefully any meet ups will be fun and relatively safe, but just in case, set yourself up for success by maintaining what control you can.

From one adult to another, these are all suggestions rather than rules. Many people on Grindr choose not to follow various ones, and that's fine. Take some time to think about what you're comfortable with and make your decisions accordingly.

Also, best practice for someone sending an unsolicited dick pic (if you don't want them) is just to block that person. But sending a return picture like this one is a hilarious option.

-Reid

#he speaks #sex advice #sex education #internet advice #life advice #grindr #internet etiquette #internet brother

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hungwy · 2 months

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I’ve seen many people reblog a post which contains tweets that, in my eyes, amount to a single complaint that is only half true (but that I agree with for the most part). But anyway, here’s a longpost:

(tweet in question)

I think it’s mostly wrong to say FPS multiplayer “peaked” ("was most fun for the playerbase"?) with Source games in the way presented. Believe it or not, you can still join a server with 30 people playing on a user map with fucked up assets everywhere, and some of the 30 people playing will be 14-year-olds with bad mics getting mad at being spawn killed by someone with 20,000 hours in the game. In fact, there are servers like this in most Source games, including Garry’s Mod, TF2, and CSS and CSGO (but honestly I think TF2 is most representative of the above scenario). I just launched Valve’s community server browser and have found an unending list of silly-sounding servers for TF2: Minecraft trade, Murder at the Mannor, Zombie Escape, Medieval Mode, all full or near-full. I checked Garry’s Mod: SCP-RP, Zombie Survival, Clone Wars Roleplay, “Swamp Cinema”, 1980’s Mafia Roleplay, DarkRP (x20), again, all well-populated. Admittedly CS2 was mostly deathmatch servers (due to it being Source 2 and not Source and so missing a lot of plugins that would allow for “fun” servers), but CSS still had surf, bhop, minigames, and jailbreak servers still going and full. My server browser won’t show CSGO for whatever reason, but up until CS2 released I know for a fact that these silly ass servers still exist there too. The implication that these servers and their conditions are gone is wrong. You don’t want a server with the exact same conditions though, I think you want to relive the specific memories you’re having and feel happiness again. But maybe I’m going too far there.

How about this. I’ll give it to you, Dusk developer, that for you FPS multiplayer peaked with insane TF2 trade servers, but you also make boomer shooters for a living, so I think you’re biased towards enjoying an older generation of games anyway. Modern FPS games are fantastic and in their own ways contain a lot of fun. Modern games in general fill the spaces that, for you, TF2 servers filled. Have you seen Roblox minigames and Minecraft server plugins? They’re actually crazy and decently well made. I’m excited that kids have grown up in such a good environment for games. They have tons of options that we didn’t have back then. It’s awesome! Like, don’t let your nostalgia blind you to the fact that kids are having just as much fun as you now. TF2 and Garry’s Mod are not the be-all, end-all of FPS multiplayer fun. That sentiment I completely disagree with and think people should get over.

But like, how the hell does competitive gaming play into this? I truly don’t buy the wording of “Esports and competitive ranking ruined multiplayer”. It’s just not true. Not only are the servers you’re mourning still exist, they’re still well-populated and their “golden age” coincided with some of the greatest heights in competitive FPS gaming. You know what’s funny? When CSGO released in 2012, TF2 saw a drop of almost 10,000 average players. It recovered basically the next year. Besides a small dip in 2018, TF2 had held around 50,000 average players since its release, until 2019 where its average player-count has risen to about 80,000 players. Garry’s Mod wouldn’t peak in total concurrent players until 2015 and has had a dedicated core of players averaging around 25,000 since like 2013. Seriously, these are incredibly consistent player-counts throughout the release of Overwatch, PUBG, Fortnite, Apex, and Valorant. In fact, contrary to the tweeter's implicit assumptions, it seems like nothing much has changed, and that competitive gaming did not, at all, ruin or depopulate these “fun” spaces.

So, again, how does competitive gaming and esports play into this? Only thing I think is valid is the fact that a few popular modern FPSes don’t do the whole “community-hosted server” thing: Apex, Fortnite, PUBG, Valorant, and Overwatch all do not have native community-hosted server support. Which, to be frank, is bad for their competitive gaming scene too! Esports has ALWAYS used self-hosted servers for practicing to get better. I don’t know the argument for not having these sorts of things, maybe not developing the toolkit for these things is easier than developing them. IDK. But I agree that it is bad that many popular games don’t support this sort of thing. The “self-hosted netizen” is a category of person that’s been declining for a long time regardless of the effect of competitive first-person shooter games on the casual first-person shooter games self-hosted server market. But again, for the topic of the post, I think this is a completely nonsensical implication. As far as I can tell ALL Valve-made Source engine games have active and popular community servers still, and the popular games ALL have very populated servers with “fun” gamemodes and atmospheres. Competitive has grown very popular, yes. It's true. It's fun to compete, everyone knows it. But esports has taken very little if anything away from the casual playerbase of Source games.

(Also, for the record, during the actual multiplayer FPS golden age of the time, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 shooters, there were no self-hosted servers for us, and it was still the most fun anyone ever had playing casually on console. It was the age of trickshotting and montages, man! For the intent of this post that exact restriction counts as “keeping players from interacting with one another” yet these games, especially COD, were, uh… infamously social. Not to mention these games had competitive scenes alongside the casual scene perfectly fine.)

I think, really, ignoring the actual content of the tweet, these tweets are just about nostalgia for your childhood. Which is fine! You can miss things you used to do for fun and no longer do. Probably every human that’s ever existed has gone through this. I mean, again, it is kind of popular in current culture to be nostalgic. The 90s aesthetic, early 2000s media, retro games, super hero movies, cartoons being consumed by adults to a greater degree than ever, et cetera. I think to some extent the complaint itself isn’t like, a completely unclouded judgement of the Decline of The Beauty of Multiplayer Gaming throughout the years. The concrete complaints in those tweets seem both a little rose-tinted and unnecessarily doomerpilled to me. But like, regardless, it’s kind of your fault for not returning to these things, man. Go join one of those servers if you’re not busy being an adult with a job and friends and other obligations that may keep you from doing things that you’re not used to and have fun like you did in childhood. Or is that what's actually the problem…? I don’t know. A suggestion. I just think in the end the complaint isn't valid.

This post is long and I had a LOT of thoughts that I may have missed or chopped off at the incorrect time. I think the picture I'm trying to build has probably been communicated, though? Maybe I’m not considering something, maybe I overinterpreted implications, maybe the fact that the playerbase of TF2 and Garry's Mod being highly consistent for ten years or whatever is not indicative of anything I've said, but I hope regardless you understand that like, at least part of this tweet is weird to say in the ways I've attempted to untease. People young and old are still having crazy times in video games and esports has done, as far as I can tell, absolutely nothing to change at, ever.

Turning off reblogs because I have a feeling anyone who doesn't follow me might become annoying about this

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thearchercore · 2 months

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Hi, thank you so much for sharing those early (hilariously awkward) moments between Charles and Max as well as those behind race stories. I wonder if you may have some thoughts about reasons that intrigued people to ship lestappen before they started to interact with each other in a more active and friendly way?

I am asking this because of my curiosity for the early lestappen days and lestappen fandom. I started to watch F1 in 2022, the year had some really exciting battles between these two and then witnessed the Austria GP where basically people were watching them fucking (not) on the podium. I love the respectful and supportive rival relationship so much that I started my lestappen fandom, and soon learned that they are not always this happy when being together. But it seems that there are fans who already shipped lestappen for a certain period at that point. I always want to learn the journey of these awesome people who can figure out the gem ship, especially when now we have so many wonderful lestappen moments.

Thanks!

i think their connected history did a lot of the major pull - the inchident clip was pretty much out in the wild when charles was about to join f1 so people immediately made the connection.

they got asked about it during that time and both said they didn't like each other back then but get on better terms now. max also mentioned charles as his big rival back when charles was a sauber rookie and didn't really have the f1 results to back it up.

but bear in mind, back then red bull really pushed max and daniel. they were the big thing, they were teammates and max was a teenager that laughed at everything that came his way lol. they were the more appealing dynamic.

so charles coming into the equation wasn't really anything big up until their first on track battles in 2019 & then the championship fight in 2022.

they pretty much served back then the "enemies" narrative that was so appealing and fresh in the new generation of drivers. now it's different, it's more on the "rival" scale but there's mutual respect so they fit more into the "friends" category. their dynamic really changed throughout the years. to the point they're *checks notes* 36 fics away from catching up maxiel on ao3 (bear in mind, they had more seasons together in f1 before charles joined so they had a head start)

so yeah, back then i think the premise of their connected history really made people look and consider them as an appealing duo.

now we actually have moments to back up the initial premise and years of build up to whatever they have going on now. when you count their years in karting, you get the ultimate slow burn dynamic. their story is about 15 years in the making and the lore is rich.

to sum it up, let's quote max who said "i always knew that if i made it to f1, charles would also make it" which pretty much sums up how max always thought of them subliminally as pair, a package deal.

#charles leclerc #lestappen #max verstappen

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leveloneandup · 9 months

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I think what was most helpful for me in my time, kind of coming up to playing and getting a lot of minutes at the World Cup in 2019, was when the older players would tell me that they thought I was good.

I remember, in particular, there were a few camps, the end of 2018 and early 2019, where I was really just fighting for a spot. I was kind of borderline even getting called into camp. But I started doing really well at these camps and I remember so specifically. Pinoe, Tobin, Becky started, kind of sporadically, just giving me a little bit of a nudge after training or in the hotel and going, 'Sam, you need to keep this up. You're doing so great. We're going to need you.' And to hear that from your heroes, these women that you look up to so much, for them to just say, even one time, 'That was awesome, you had a great training today, we're going to need you.' It means so much.

Coming from a teammate, there's just such a level of respect because you are all fighting for time out there, that for somebody to take time and to go up to you and be like, 'Hey, you're crushing it.' It really just means the world. There's nobody who understands better than a teammate.

There's nobody who can make you feel better about something than a teammate, especially— My gosh, I remember when Tobin told me I was doing good, I was just like, 'I did it. Like, I'm done. I've done what I set out to do.'

I was like, 'Oh thanks, you think?' No, I was like, 'Oh my god, thank you so much!'

I probably called my mom and was like, 'Mom. You'll never guess what happened...'

I thought I was cool about it, but I was not.

—Sam Mewis on encouragement from her teammates, Men in Blazers 08/01/23: Do it Live: USWNT vs. Portugal INSTANT REAX

#sam mewis #tobin heath #megan rapinoe #becky sauerbrunn #uswnt #men in blazers

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miloformula123fan · 3 months

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Ollie x reader with dialouge 2, 37 and 57 where theyre childhood friends?

and then after the reveal arthur sees the childhood photos of them and dialogue 32 comes into play and its just all really fluffy and cute

omg i loved this! also i promise i'm working on all requests, not just Lizzy's haha

Please keep requesting - y'all have awesome ideas we agree on a lot of stuff :) - my guidelines are here, and if you want some prompts, they are here.

also feel free to come in and start chatting to me in my asks, would love to get to know y'all better

I’m right here. I’m always right in front of you but you never see me!

I always have and always will be here for you

I want the whole world to know about us

It’s always been her, hasn’t it?

ollie bearman x reader

---

2014

You watched as the young boy stormed away from the kart now embedded in the wall. Ignoring the sheer relief that you felt, you left the stands to meet him in the paddock where you knew he would be. You spotted him and tried to jog to catch up to him.

“Ollie! Ollie! OLLIE!”

“Yes? What do you- oh. Y/N. Hey” he looked sheepish as he started at the ground as you caught up to him.

“You doing okay? That was a big impact.”

“Yeah I’m fine, just annoyed about the crash. Probably wasn’t my opportunity for the overtake and now my dad has to repair the kart and-”

“Shh, it’s okay Ollie. One race isn’t going to ruin all your chances to make it to F1. and even if it does, I always have and always will be here for you.”

“Thank you, y/n.”

2019

“I cannot understand why it always ends like this. Why cannot girls like me for who I am, instead of who I could be. They always want to be with me preparing for my money and wanting to be an f1 wag, but then when they realise that it’s not all glamour, and there’s hard work and I try to be there.”

“Ollie, in the nicest way possible, I’m gonna need you to shut up.”

“What-why? Y/N you’ve always been my bestie ”

“I’m right here. I’m always right in front of you but you never see me! And yet somehow I am ‘your bestie’ and I have to put up with all your ‘oh i don’t understand why these girls do not like me.’ Ollie, fuck it I am in love with you and I am sick of pretending otherwise.”

Before you could say anything else, Ollie quickly pressed his lips to yours.

2021

“Y/N I want the whole world to know about us. I know you think I shouldn’t due to hate and people calling you a gold digger, but I’m sick of just pretending we’re childhood friends. I want to kiss you when I win races and show you off!”

“Fine. Don’t make me regret this. And if I do, we’re going back to being private again, okay?”

“Of course, love!”

2024

“Aww, you and Y/n were so cute!”

“WERE???”

“You are a little painful but otherwise I supposed you two are still cute. But come on, how can this…”

“Become this?”

"Oi!"

Arthur looked at Ollie’s smile as he gazed at the photos. He smiled back.

“It’s always been her, hasn’t it?”

“Yeah”

#f1 fic #f2 fic #miloformula123fan #f1 x reader #f2 x reader #ollie bearman x reader #f1 fanfic #f2 fanfic #ollie bearman x you

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hkthatgffan · 10 months

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The fanmade Gravity Falls episode called Return to the Bunker is now out!!

youtube

I'll give my 2 cents below so, spoiler alert from here on out!

I loved how the episode was done. The artists did some amazing work with the animation and storyboarding for it. It surpasses in many ways even the work on Deep Woods. The VA's all did an awesome job too, with all of them being very close in getting to the voices of the original characters. I think the story was also really creative, fun and lore/character building. I've always longed for an episode diving into Mabel and Ford's bond and this episode did a great job with it. I also loved stuff like Stan and Dipper bonding, Wendy having more than just a background character role for once, how it explained stuff like the rift crack and especially that insane ending that makes it feel almost like a canon episode.

I have heard some negatives in regards to stuff like how Ford was handled by a lot of the Ford fans in the community which isn't too surprising given his character's love. I will admit personally that I felt Ford could have been handled better and as a retired fanfic and episode idea writer myself, it's not how I would have handled Ford, but I don't think for a sec it was unsalvageable. I think it would have worked better if Ford had more reasoning to why he was acting like that beyond trust no one, or that the end had him perhaps do what he did when they all were asleep so we wouldn't see the heartbreak in Mabel over that, but it is a fan episode. It's not how I would do it or probably Alex Hirsch, but that's us. I also feel there were plot holes here and there that were a bit hard to ignore that made the episode feel a bit clunky compared to how it was advertised.

But truth be told, the effort to put something like this together outweighs the flaws in it and I mean, it's fanmade so it's not actually canon or going to affect the show overall. IMO, Lost Legends had a lot more problems in how it handled the Mabel situation in ways (though that may be a bit of my left over Ford critic speaking from my younger days in the fandom when I was getting into all sorts of arguments over the Mabel issue with Ford fans on GF Amino but that's a tale for another day).

All in all, it was a great episode. If I had to give it a rating, I'd say 7.5/10 or 8/10. A huge congrats to the whole team for finishing it and releasing it. I know from speaking to Deep Woods members just how long and difficult these things can take to make and no matter the story, I'll always have respect for the artists and VA's who bring fan projects like this to life. What other cartoon has a fandom as dedicated as this one? Gravity Falls fans are one of a kind and 11 years on, we still show our love for this show in a greater way than other fandoms ever can.

To sum up, I have my pluses and minuses with this episode. Some are ones most fans will agree on and others will likely be a bit harder to do which I get. But my overall final take on it is good and my final rating out of 10 is a firm 7.5-8. I will agree though that Ford could have been handled better. Even back in 2018-2019 when I was writing fanfics and a bit more..."aggressive," in my stance of Ford to say it lightly, I did my best to write him in a way I felt was more aware and compassionate than RTTB Ford was. I am happy with how the episode handled Mabel however. I was so afraid they'd pull a Don't Dimension It type pattern but it was way better and I felt it was a decent step towards a Ford and Mabel like story. Still a way to go but not horrible.

But those are my two cents on Return to the Bunker.

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leclerqueensainz · 1 year

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A Family of Three (C.L 16) - Part.I- Discoveries, Reunions, and Surprises

Paring: Charles Leclerc X OC!Marie Anderson

Synopsis: Charles and Marie ended any chance of a relationship years ago. They just didn't expect to have to share custody of a child after the death of their best friend.

⚠️ Warnings: Mention of death and murder, swearing, Charles being a little aggressive in his reactions, mention of sex and drug use. (This chapter may contain triggers!) (+16)

**In this story, Jules Bianchi died in 2019, not 2015, which changes some facts in the careers of the drivers.

A.N: Hello! How are you doing? After a long time, I finally brought Part 1 translated into English! Remembering that English is not my first language, so there may be some mistakes! I tried my best!

Feedback is always welcome. Let me know if you liked it!

Word Count: 7.882

Read the prologue here!

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January 15th, 2023 - Milan, Italy

"Good morning, Marcella!" I greet my secretary as I enter the office. "Any news for me?" I ask the blonde girl who is sitting with her eyes fixed on the computer in front of her.

"Good morning, Marie! And...HA! I did it!" Marcella suddenly jumps, startling me. "I'm sorry! It's just that I managed to schedule the meeting with Fred Lacroix for next week." She says, trying to compose herself, and I smile."

"That's great! You're amazing," I say, leaning over next to her at the table and taking a peek at her computer. "Do you think he'll be in a good mood? He's not exactly known for being pleasant when it comes to selling and buying his art," I ask and Marcella just shrugs.

"I don't know, and honestly, I don't worry about it," she says, and I can see a smug smile spread across her face. "Either way, we're awesome! We always get what we want," she finishes, and I laugh at her enthusiasm.

I agree with Marcella. We are awesome and always get what we want when it comes to work.

After Jules died, I moved from Monaco to Italy. I felt like I needed to leave it all behind, even if it meant burying a part of who I was with my past. I needed a fresh start, and I closed my eyes to my old life. I had nothing left in Monaco. Nothing held me back or was even worth staying for.

I needed time and a new life, and that's exactly what I found when I came to Italy, where I was able to enroll in arts just in time to continue the school year. And a year and a half later, I graduated and started interning at one of the best galleries in Milan. Shortly after that, I realized I had a lot of potential for curating and dedicated myself to the field, of which today I am still a part, with the highest success rate in recruiting and selling new artists.

Today, I can say that my life is more than comfortable, and I spend so much of my day occupied with work that I hardly have time to think about everything I left behind a few years ago.

"Ah!" Marcella screams and catches me off guard, making me take a few steps back.

"Oh my god, Marcella! You're going to kill me, girl!" I say and put my hand on my chest, feeling my heart skipping like crazy.

"Sorry! I just remembered you got a letter this morning," she says, and I swear my confusion is written all over my face. "I mean, you didn't really get it, it's more like 'they passed the envelope under the door while we were closed, and I stepped on it when I got here'," she says and pulls out a crumpled white envelope with a half footprint on it. "I tried to clean it up, but as you can see, it didn't go very well. Seriously, someone should clean the streets of Milan more," she says and hands me the envelope.

I examine the envelope to find the sender, but I only find "Marie Anderson" written in delicate handwriting.

"There's no sender. That's strange." I say and Marcella nods.

"I thought it was kind of creepy too. I mean, who still sends letters In 2023? Isn't it easier to send a message on Insta? Or like, an email?" I nod my head and shrug.

"Well, let it be," I say and start walking towards my office. "Please let anyone who wants to speak to me know to leave a message. And that includes my mom, okay?" I say and Marcella nods. "Great, thanks," I say, entering my office and closing the door behind me.

I throw my bag on the desk and sit in my chair. I analyze the envelope in my hand again and for a moment, I feel a strange sensation as I stare at it.

"Okay, let's end the suspense, Marie," I say to myself and I grab a staple remover from the pencil holder, passing it over the glued part of the envelope.

Opening the envelope, I take out a sheet of paper with the same handwriting as the envelope, and two photos of a little boy with dark hair and eyes who I swear I've never seen before, but who somehow seems very familiar to me. I turn over the photos to see if there's anything written on the back.

"Vincenzo. 24/12/2021"

Was written in one of the photos. The little boy was sitting next to what looked like a Christmas tree. I took a look at the next photograph, where the same boy, who seemed a bit older, was sitting on a mat surrounded by toys. "Vincenzo. 19/12/2022."

Feeling even more confused and with a strange sensation spreading through my chest, I picked up the letter I had left aside on the table and began to read it.

France, January 2nd, 2023.

Marie,

I can't even begin to tell you how many times I've thought about how I would write to you. You don't know me, and to be honest, I don't think anyone in his circle of friends and family has even heard of me.

My name is Cecilia, and that's all you need to know about me right now, aside from what I'm about to write to you next: I was engaged to Jules Bianchi.

I know this is strange and perhaps even unbelievable, but it's true. Jules and I had a brief but passionate love story. I loved Jules, and I can say that he loved me too.

Two days before his death, I found out that I was pregnant. I gave birth to Vincenzo on December 24th, 2019. He was a healthy and strong little boy, very similar to Jules.

I loved him from the moment I found out he was growing inside me. The result of something so pure and beautiful, from my relationship with Jules.

I know it's a lot for you to process right now, but so that you can know that I'm telling you the truth, there are two photos of Vincenzo. I want you to look at them and see Jules, just as I do every time I look at my son.

"I've been wanting to write to you for a long time. Jules saw you as a sister. I'm sorry I hid this from you and his family too, but I was so afraid. Afraid of rejection, of being seen as a liar. I couldn't go through any of that. I only had Jules, and after he left me, there was no one else I could trust, so I've been raising Vincenzo alone until now, but I don't think I can do it anymore. Vincenzo has a family besides me. And I need him to grow up knowing that he is loved.

I promise I to explain everything you need to know. Please meet me at the café where you used to meet every time you came together to Nice. January 18th at 4 pm.

- Cecilia.

My hands tremble as I put the letter back on the table.

What the hell is this? Is this some kind of sick joke?

I take the two photos back in my hands and stare at them, now realizing why I found that boy so familiar. It was Jules. That boy is the spitting image of Jules.

But how is this even possible? Why didn't Jules tell us he had someone? That's not like him. Jules was always an open book to us. He told us everything, just as we did with him. He wouldn't hide this from us...would he?

With my head swimming with questions and my heart heavy as lead, I found myself shouting Marcella's name, and less than a minute later, her short locks appeared through the door.

My hands tremble as I put the letter back on the table.

What the hell is this? Is this some kind of sick joke?

I take the two photos back in my hands and stare at them, now realizing why I found that boy so familiar. It was Jules. That boy is the spitting image of Jules.

With my head swimming with questions and my heart heavy as lead, I found myself shouting Marcella's name, and less than a minute later, her short locks appeared through the door.

"Yes?" She asks before looking at me for a moment and entering my office complete with a worried expression. "Are you okay, Marie?" She says kneeling by my side.

"Book a flight for tomorrow morning. I need to go to France."

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January 18th, 2023. - Nice, France.

I stare again at the clock hanging on the wall above the counter of the small café. 3:45 PM.

15 minutes. Just 15 minutes until I could find out who Cecilia was and why she decided to contact me now, after all this time. And why me? Yes, Jules, Charles, and I were always very close despite the age difference. But why reach out to me? If she intended to introduce the boy to Jules' family, why didn't she contact Christine or Philippe?

I hadn't seen Jules' family in a long time, we didn't even exchange messages. I left them behind when I decided to move on to Italy. They were buried with my past in Monaco.

The bell on the entrance door rings, indicating that someone has entered the premises. My head quickly snaps toward the sound.

And it's like in one minute, everything I struggled so hard to forget and leave behind comes back with force and without control like waves of a tsunami.

Standing just a few meters away from where I'm sitting, my gaze meets Charles'.

Charles. My ex-boyfriend whom I haven't seen in almost four years. The part that hurts the most from my past, besides the death of Jules.

He looks different. So different from the last time I saw him at Jules' funeral. This time he's not dressed in mourning black, no. He's wearing casual clothes, dark jeans, and a moss green sweater with the word "FERRARI" stamped in black. There's a scruffy beard on his face and his eyes...damn. The eyes that last time reflected so much hopelessness were now more alive, but still with certain traces of concern.

Charles walks up to where I'm sitting, his steps quick and wide as if he wanted to corner me before I could escape again. He stops half a meter away, and his gaze curiously roams over me. His expression is stern but also covered in doubt. I bet that, like me, he wants to understand why I'm here.

"Charles..." I'm the first to say, my voice low and uncertain. He nods slowly, his gaze still fixed on me, as if he wants to uncover all the secrets I gained during the years we were apart.

“What are you doing here, Marie?" he asks, direct and determined, without any hesitation. It's a tone I would have never expected to hear from the Charles I left four years ago. Yes, he really has changed.

I wished I could answer him with the same intensity, but honestly, I don't think I could. There's so much going on here and my head is spinning with so many questions and emotions. Why is Charles here? What the hell is going on? Did he set all this up?

"Is this some kind of joke? Because if it is, I swear to God it's not funny," he says, his tone now rough.

I sit there staring at him, completely confused.

Charles runs his hand through his hair, messing up his brown locks even more. He sighs heavily and closes his eyes, his tongue quickly passing over his lower lip. He used to do that all the time when he felt anger or frustration. At least that hasn't changed.

"What are you doing here, Charles?" I ask, and he opens his eyes, once again staring at me.

Charles's hand reaches into his back pocket and pulls out an envelope identical to the one that was left for me in the office in Italy. The difference is that I can see that this one was addressed to Charles, only his name, and also without a sender.

"Please tell me it wasn't you, Marie," he says as his eyes shift from the envelope to my face. I look at him with all the sincerity I can muster and answer, "No, it wasn't me." He nods his head, his expression softening a bit. He moves and sits in the vacant chair in front of me, his hands going up to his face to rub it.

"Jules has a son," he says.

"I know," I reply.

"Charles lowers his hands and stares at me once again, confusion etched on his face. Before he can say anything, I reach into my bag on the table, open it, and take out the white envelope. Charles looks at my hand for a moment before reaching over the table to take the envelope from me."

"You got one too," he says, not looking at me, even though it's not a question, I nod my head in agreement.

"It seems she arranged to meet with both of us. I think it's easier if we hear the story at the same time, that way there's no risk of getting the wrong versions," I say, and his gaze shifts from the envelopes on the table to me.

"Do you think it's a lie? That the boy isn't Jules's son?" he asks seriously, and I just shrug in response.

"I believe it could be Jules's son. I just don't know why she waited all this time and why she chose us. Obviously, we're not the best people to show Vincenzo that he has a family on his father's side," I say, and I see Charles's jaw tighten.

"We were friends with Jules. He trusted us," he says, once again his voice sounding rough.

"It seems he didn't trust us enough to tell us he fell in love," I say, and immediately regret it.

I look at Charles and if we were part of a cartoon, he would have flames in his eyes.

“You don't know what happened. You don't know his reasons, just like me,” he says through gritted teeth. “Don't doubt his motives. Not when he's not here to defend himself.”

In all the years I've spent by Charles' side, I've never seen him so angry. And if I didn't know him, I'd be scared.

But do you still know him? I silently ask myself.

"That's not what I meant," I defensively reply. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean for it to come out that way. Of course, Jules had reasons and we'll find out when Cecilia arrives." Charles relaxes his jaw and adjusts in his seat.

I look at the clock on the wall again. 4:10 PM. She's late. I look at Charles, a little anxious.

"Do you think she's coming?" he shrugs, but his hand goes into his hoodie pocket and pulls out a cell phone.

"She's late," he states what I already know. "But I think so, she's coming." Charles carelessly tosses the phone onto the table, his anxious fingers fidgeting with his rings.

"Congratulations on the runner-up, by the way," I say, trying to ease both of our anxieties, and he looks back at me.

"Did you follow the races?" he asked, a little surprised.

"Yes," I admit, somewhat embarrassed. "My secretary is a huge Formula 1 fan," I add, which is not a lie.

Like all Italians, Marcella is a devoted Tifosi. And even though I wanted to leave everything I knew behind, I couldn't escape one of the most beloved sports in Europe, especially in Italy, the home of Ferrari.

Charles lets out a low laugh, his look adopting the expression of a mischievous boy. Oh no.

"Your secretary, huh?" he says with a teasing and suggestive tone.

"Ah, shut up, Leclerc!" I say, trying to sound serious but failing when I let out a laugh. "I'm serious! My secretary is a diehard Tifosi. She can't shut up for a minute about Ferrari and makes me watch all the races," I say, shrugging.

"Yeah, yeah... And I bet I'm your 'secretary's' favorite driver, right?" he says, making air quotes with his fingers and having a smug smile on his face.

"Actually, she prefers Sainz," I say, and instantly his smile turns into a serious expression, which makes me laugh.

Soon, Charles' dimples appear on his cheek and my heart skips a beat at the sound of his typically somewhat flawed and exaggerated laugh. Oh, how I enjoyed hearing that horrible but at the same time very cute laugh again.

At that moment, even though I hated to admit it, I realized how much I missed that feeling of familiarity and lightness. And even though just a few minutes ago, I was doubting whether I still knew the person that Charles had become, I could see that regardless of the years and tragedies that life had subjected him to from a young age, that kind and playful boy that I had once fallen in love with was still there. And maybe he would never leave. And I liked that.

Looking at Charles smiling, sitting in front of me, I wonder for just a second if it would have been different if I hadn't left. But as soon as the thought came, I pushed it away. Because even though I was happy to know that Charles still had something familiar to me inside him, we were not meant to be even before Jules' death. And I doubt that we could have maintained a good relationship with all the pain and mourning that surrounded us. I made a good choice. Yes, I did the right thing.

Leaving Monaco was one of the hardest things I had to face. But it made me grow and become a strong woman. I learned to deal with loss, even if it may not be the healthiest way, it still worked for me. I was able to finish college, got the job I wanted, and met new people. I fell in love, and even though I didn't love them like I loved Charles, I still allowed myself to feel and try happiness. Clearly, it didn't work out, but the experience was worth it.

And I can also say that Charles has achieved what he wanted, or almost everything. He is one of the best Formula 1 drivers and drives for Ferrari, which is almost every motorsport athlete's dream. He has a successful career and is known worldwide for it. And even though he didn't get the title he so desperately craved last year, he may get it this year. He is focused, grateful, and kind. The golden boy. Il Predestinato.

Even though Charles is so young, he has given his family and friends everything they ever dreamed of. Pascale must be so proud of him, and if Harvé were still alive, I'm sure he would also be proud of the son he raised. And Jules would also be proud to see Charles' progress.

And then the emptiness appears again. Jules. I try my best not to think about him. The memories are still painful even after all these years.

I think I let my thoughts reflect too much because Charles, who was laughing before, now looks at me with a compassionate expression. He probably thought of Jules too.

"I miss him too," he says and I nod my head. "And I missed you too," his hand meets mine on the table.

There were no ulterior motives. Just a gesture. A gesture to affirm what he was saying. And it hurt. It hurt in my heart and soul.

I quickly withdraw my hand from his and stare at the table. Charles withdraws his hands and keeps them close to his body.

"I know you didn't owe me anything, Marie. No explanations, not loyalty," he starts, his voice a little broken, making my heart tighten. "But Jules died and you left. Why did you leave?" he asks, and I can hear the hurt in his voice.

I wished I had the strength to lift my gaze and tell him while looking him in the eyes that everything I did was out of fear and thinking that there was nothing left for me in Monaco. That I still loved him even after he broke up with me and that losing Jules to death destroyed me, but knowing that I would lose Charles while he was still alive would only ruin me even more. I couldn't see him every day and know that he no longer belonged to me. And that every minute I spent mourning and heartbroken without him reminded me that love was impossible for me. That I didn't deserve to be loved. That there would never be anyone to love me.

"I had to go," I say, still staring at my hands. "I don't expect you to understand or forgive me. Because I'm not asking for any of that, Charles," my voice sounds firm but my eyes burn.

I take a deep breath and hold it for a few seconds before releasing it. I raise my gaze to meet his when I'm sure the tears won't fall.

"I had to make a choice and I did. I chose myself," I say simply, perhaps trying to convince myself.

Charles nods his head and goes back to fiddling with the rings on his fingers. This time it was difficult for him to look at me.

"I'm happy to see who you've become, Marie. And I hope you've achieved what you wanted when..." he pauses for a second, unsure of what to say, "when you left Monaco." A tired laugh escapes his lips. "I'm not going to judge you, especially since when you left, we were no longer a couple. But I was an idiot to think that we were still friends." He looks back at me. "I was foolish until I realized that there would be no possibility for us without Jules being here."

I wanted to scream. I wanted to stand up and throw everything in front of me at him. I wanted to curse at him and tell him that he didn't have that right. But to be fair, I could never do that. Not when I left, when it was me who left what was left of the three of us. Jules had died and I had fled. When I left, I didn't think of Charles or his feelings. I only thought of myself and how I could never live with that.

I don't regret it. I did what I thought was necessary and would do it again. Charles might have needed me, but I needed to leave and heal. And that's what I did. Charles still had friends and family to rely on, and I had no one. No present family, no friends, and no boyfriend. Charles and I both mourned, of course, but we mourned in different ways. He had lost a friend, and I had lost everything.

There was no one to come home to and hug. There was no one there to tell me that they were sorry for my loss and that everything would be okay. So I went after what I thought I needed and I got it. I went in search of myself, a new life, new choices, and opportunities, and I found them. I found myself. Of course, I let go of a lot, and the void left by Jules and Charles was never filled, but I learned to cope and use it to my advantage for other things, and that was enough, at least for now.

Before I could respond to him, I'm interrupted once again by the sound of the damn doorbell.

Charles and I turned our attention to the door at the same time. Both of us were staring at a slim blonde woman, wearing a green coat and leggings. But what caught our attention the most was the little boy in her arms. He was about 3 or 4 years old, with dark hair, lying with his face hidden in the woman's neck, and his small hand clutching onto her collar as if he were afraid she would leave if he let go.

Charles and I stood up in rehearsed gestures, all at the same time. He stopped beside me, his hand resting on my shoulder, covered by my own coat this time. The woman looked at us and came slowly towards us. When she got closer and stopped about a meter away from us, I could analyze her.

Her face was thin and perfectly symmetrical, and even though it seemed like she hadn't slept in days, her tired eyes were a beautiful shade of greenish-brown. She is very beautiful. Her lips opened in a small smile, and there I could see that she easily fit Jules' type.

"I assume you are Charles and Marie, right?" She says, her voice sweet and tired.

My gaze moves from her to the little boy in her arms, and then they cross with Charles'. He tells me through his eyes the same things I am thinking. We return our attention to the blonde in front of us and nod.

"Great!" She clears her throat before continuing, "I'm Cecilia, and this little guy here is Vincenzo." She gently shakes the child, who tightens his grip on her coat collar even more. "Jules' son."

Charles' grip on my shoulder becomes stronger, and I swallow hard. I can't take my eyes off the little boy, and now up close, I can see his profile. His chubby childlike cheek and long eyelashes, just like Jules'.

Cecilia shifts uncomfortably, her feet shifting the weight from one to the other, and she adjusts Vincenzo's position in her lap.

"I know you must have thousands of questions, and I promise I will answer them all. But before that, would you mind if I sit down? Vincenzo is a bit heavy, and I walked here with him in my arms," she says, embarrassed.

"Of course not. Please," Charles approaches her and pulls the chair he was sitting in a few minutes ago. Cecilia sits down, careful not to make any sudden movements and wake Vincenzo.

Charles points to the empty chair, and I sit down. He takes a few steps hto the table next to us and takes an unoccupied chair to sit on. Once the three of us are seated around the table, Charles calls the waitress, whom I only now notice has been staring at us this whole time. The redheaded and smiling girl, who probably can't be more than 19 years old, approaches with her gaze fixed on Charles- she probably recognized him.

Charles is the one who orders. A cappuccino for me- which causes a sensation in my stomach that he still remembers- an iced tea for himself, and he asks Cecilia what she would like to drink, to which she responds that coffee would be enough. The redhead writes down the orders and asks for permission to leave. Her eyes still glued to Charles.

I roll my eyes internally, but I know I can't blame her. After all, it's probably not every day that she serves a public figure. When we used to come here with Jules, the employees were different, and the small café is located on a somewhat isolated street in Nice, so it's unlikely that many famous people come here.

I take my gaze off the waitress and turn back to Cecilia, who was already looking at me attentively with a small smile on her lips.

"Well..." Charles begins. "Why are we here, Cecilia? Why only now have you contacted us?" He leans forward a little more, his arms resting on the wooden table.

Cecilia shifts in her chair carefully and her eyes briefly glance at Vincenzo before turning back to us.

"I wanted you to meet Vincenzo. While he was alive, Jules always mentioned you as part of his family. He loved you both very much," she says, and I feel my chest tightening.

"But why only now?" I speak for the first time. "I know you wrote in the letter that you were afraid, but it still sounds strange that you would come looking for us now, without any reason," I say, trying to keep my voice steady.

Cecilia falls silent for a few seconds as if she wants to formulate the next words carefully.

"There's a reason," she confirms. "Look, I know it's strange, and I assure you that I'm not looking for any money or anything like that." Her gaze shifts from me to Charles, as if she wants to confirm the latter part specifically for him. "Jules and I met about six months before he died, and it was love at first sight."

"He never told us about you," Charles responds cutting her off and she nods.

"I know he didn't. I asked him not to," she says and Charles and I exchange confused looks before turning our attention back to her.

"What do you mean? Why would you ask him not to?" I ask, finding it all very odd.

"When I met Jules, I was in a complicated time in my life," she answers and I see her face darken. "I was only 19 and had run away from Italy." Her voice trembles as if it's hard for her to mention those times again.

I wish I could tell her that she didn't need to tell us if she wasn't feeling comfortable, but the truth was that it was really necessary. After all, that's what Charles and I are here for.

Charles nodded for her to continue and I could feel his tension.

"I got involved with the wrong people in Italy," she continues. "There was a boy I had been in love with during my teenage years, Paolo was his name. We were very young and stupid, you know?" Cecília laughs and her eyes fill with tears. "Like every teenager, we thought we were invincible, but we weren't. When I was 17, I spent most of my time at parties and clubs with him. We drank and did drugs, and everything was fun and happy until it wasn't anymore. Over time, the drinking and drugs stopped being just for parties and began to become necessary for anything. From being able to concentrate on studies, to being able to get out of bed. My parents assumed that Paolo was to blame for my addiction and banned me from seeing him. I obviously went against them and they made me choose between a life with them or my ruin with Paolo. I, being young and foolish, chose love and abandoned my parents without looking back. I left the life I had to chase adventures with Paolo and he did the same, running away from home. But the thing is, we were two addicted people without a home and money. There was no more money from our parents, so we started doing whatever we could. Small thefts and even..." She stops for a moment, thick tears streaming down her face.

"Here." Charles extends a napkin and she takes it, wiping her face immediately after.

"Thank you," she says and he offers her a half-smile. "Even prostitution," she continues, and I feel my stomach churn. It wasn't disgust, but rather a pity for imagining someone in that situation. Beside me, I could see that Charles was equally uncomfortable. It was hard for him to put himself in her place.

Charles grew up with great parents who did everything for their children, and even though they weren't millionaires at the time, they still managed to have and offer a comfortable life for them. And I bet that if any of the three, Charles, Lorenzo, or Arthur, had gone the wrong way, Pascale would never have abandoned them.

And me, well, I was lucky. I spent my teenage years with Jules and Charles, who had a structured enough family to share with me because my parents were absent.

Obviously, Charles and I had our rebellious phase with occasional drinking and smoking weed. But Jules, being almost ten years older than us, always kept us in line like a good older brother. And if he knew that we had crossed the line at parties or anywhere else, oh God! He would freak out.

- "Cecilia, I know it's difficult for you to say this, but I think it's important for Charles and me to understand," I say and she nods.

Cecília takes two deep breaths before continuing, and that's when I'm sure the story would only get worse. I try to prepare myself to hear what she had to say.

"I prostituted myself a few times without Paolo's knowledge. Some traffickers gave me drugs in exchange for sex and since many times I had no other choice, I accepted. But one day he found out and that ended us. With us." Tears returned to stream down her face. "Paolo went crazy when he found out and went after the trafficker I had slept with. He got a gun and killed the guy. We were on the run for a few weeks, but it was too hard for two homeless addicts to hide in Italy. Soon they found us and..." She closes her eyes and sobs.

I stretch my hand across the table and take Cecilia's hand. There was a lot of pain there and part of me wanted to curl up and stop listening, but I couldn't. I glance at Charles and he meets my gaze, his eyes reflecting distress at hearing everything that came out of her mouth. It was too surreal for him to hear all of that.

"They killed Paolo and thought they had killed me too. But by some miracle, I managed to survive and ask for help at a church. The priest there was friends with my parents and managed to find a family in Nice who were willing to help me. So I came to France, went through rehabilitation, and started attending meetings for drug addicts." Her eyes become distant again, and I continue holding her hand. "It was on the way back from one of those meetings that I met Jules, and that's where I understood the reason why I survived. We fell in love, but he had a public life and I couldn't expose myself because I was afraid that they would come after me. I told Jules what had happened and unlike what I thought he would do, he embraced me. He promised me that he wouldn't tell anyone, not even you two until I was ready and safe. And he did that. He kept us a secret for months. We saw each other every time he came back to Nice, after the races." She finishes.

Charles and I watched as Cecilia tried to calm her breathing, her grip on the sleeping Vincenzo's body tightening as if afraid he might disappear from her arms at any moment.

It breaks my heart to see all her pain and gives me a completely different perspective from when I walked in here today. She loved Vincenzo, and that was clear, just as she had loved Jules. And that's the part that hurts me the most.

Knowing that the reason Jules never mentioned her to us, his friends and family, was sole to protect her, made my heart heavy and warm at the same time. That was so Jules.

I remember months before he died, he started to spend more time in his hometown and whenever we asked him about it, he said he wanted to spend a little more time with his family. We even found it a little strange, but Jules always had a great relationship with his parents and closest relatives, which made us simply let it go and just enjoy the time we spent together before he and Charles had to go back to racing.

"I'm sorry for all of this, really, Cecilia," Charles is the first to say after she seems calmer. "But we still need to know why you're only coming to us now," he says, and I agree.

Cecilia nods and looks at Vincenzo in her arms. The tension emanating from her makes me shiver, and Charles probably noticed it too as his hand finds my thigh under the table.

"About two days before Jules' death, I found out I was pregnant with Vincenzo," she says and I nod in understanding. "Jules was racing in Shanghai and I was scared and alone here." The tears that had ceased returned in stronger waves.

My mind teleports back to 2019, to Jules' last race. He was so happy to finish seventh that day. But, all of a sudden, he just wanted to go home and rest, not even celebrating with the boys on the grid.

"I sent him a message after the race. I said I needed him to come to Nice as soon as possible because something had happened," Cecilia looks at Charles as she speaks. "Then he sent me a message saying he would take the first available flight back to France."

As Cecilia talks, Charles' grip on my thigh gets stronger. I look at him from the corner of my eye and I can see the moment his Adam's apple goes up and down.

"So that's why he left so quickly that day," Charles' voice sounds low. "He left before I could talk to him..." His eyes fill with tears and his breathing becomes a bit unstable. Cecilia just nods and closes her eyes tightly before continuing.

"When Jules arrived in Nice, it was already early morning and it was raining heavily. He tried to get a taxi or Uber, but couldn't get either," this time I feel my breathing falter a bit as she continues. "He managed to rent a car from a nearby 24-hour agency and sent me a message saying he would arrive soon and that I didn't need to worry because no matter what was happening, everything would be okay and that he loved me."

Charles stood up abruptly. His face adopted a look of disbelief.

"It was you..." his voice was weak and accusatory. "It was because of you that he... My God!" He flinches and his hands pass through his face and his hair.

"Charles..." I try to calm him down, even though I am also anxious. "Charles, please sit down and try to calm down." I try to grab his hand, but he recoils in a sudden movement.

"Calm down? It's her, Marie!" he says, pointing to Cecilia who only shrinks into her chair and holds Vincenzo even tighter, as he moves uncomfortably in her lap. "She killed him! IT'S HER FAULT THAT JULES DIED!" he screams.

My breathing becomes difficult and my heart races. In front of me, Cecilia sobs and holds Vincenzo even closer to her body.

All that commotion made some employees start to appear and approach at a safe distance from the table.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Cecilia pleads. "I swear I never wanted this to happen, I was so scared and..." She stops when she hears Vincenzo's low cry.

Charles' attention goes to the little boy as he realizes he is now awake. He shakes his head in a negative motion and leaves the café in a hurry, slamming the door hard behind him. We are startled by the noise and the little boy cries even louder. I quickly get up to go after Charles, but before I do, I turn to Cecilia.

"Please wait here, okay? I'll try to calm him down. Don't leave," I say, and she nods, her face stained with tears that continued to fall, and her breathing accelerated as she rocked Vincenzo, trying to calm him down.

A dark-haired waitress approaches with a glass of water in her hands and places it in front of Cecilia. I thank her with a gesture and quickly leave through the door to find Charles.

It doesn't take me long to find him, he was in front of a black car. His body leaned against the driver's side. Even from a distance, I can see his body shaking and hear the sound of his erratic breathing. I approach him slowly, so as not to startle him.

When I get close enough, I think about touching him, but the thought leaves my mind when I realize it's not a good idea.

"Charles..." I call him softly to get his attention. "I'm sorry, but we need to go back there. She-"

"No!" he exclaims. "Please, Marie! Don't ask me to go back there. She killed him! It was her fault!" He stares at me with red and swollen eyes.

My heart tightens at the sight of him like this. I find myself being sent back to the year of Jules' death, specifically to the day of his funeral.

I wanted to hug Charles and tell him that everything would be okay, but in reality, I didn't know if it would. Jules had died almost four years ago, and yet it still hurt every time his name was mentioned. And hearing today from a stranger the reasons that resulted in his death was not easy. But there was a reason why Cecilia wanted to contact us after all this time, and we needed to know.

I take a deep breath and decide to approach Charles more. One of us had to try to be rational at this moment, and if it had to be me, okay. I wasn't going to go back to Italy without an answer.

"Charles, I understand that it's difficult to hear all of this suddenly," my hands go to his face. "I know it hurts, Charles. I'm feeling it too." He closes his eyes and I feel tears rolling down my face. "But we can't blame her entirely, Charles. She was scared and just wanted to talk to him.”

“And it resulted in his death." He says, his eyes opening and meeting mine. "Marie, if she hadn't done what she did, he would be here now. He would be alive and he would have met..." His voice trails off. "He would have met his son." He cries and I pull him into a hug.

Jules died without knowing his son. Jules died without knowing that he would have a son. Jules died in the dark without knowing what was happening to Cecilia. Jules died alone and worried, and nothing we can do will bring him back. He died. It's over. But Charles and I are still here.

"Jules died without knowing his son, but we're still here and we can do this for him," I say and he squeezes me tighter.

"We're still here, Charles. And we can do this." He breaks the hug and looks at me with a face full of sorrow. I nod.

"We need to go in there together. Together," he looks down at his feet. "Charles, I need you to go in there with me because I can't do this alone." His eyes come back to me and he understands that I used the same words he did a few years ago. "Please, Charles. I don't want to do this alone. I can't." He nods and I take his hand and slowly lead him back to the cafe.

When we walk through the door, my eyes meet Cecilia's. I nod my head to let her know it's okay, and she nods in understanding. I look at Charles who stares at her expressionlessly. His gaze is icy, totally different from the one I once knew.

Still holding Charles' hand, I walk toward the table where she uncomfortably waits for us. I notice that Vincenzo is no longer in her lap and feel momentary concern that quickly passes when I see him playing with the same red-haired waitress who had served us.

We sit in our chairs and I see that our orders are placed on the table. I feel my stomach churn just looking at the cappuccino in front of me. I take glance around and notice the employees trying to avoid looking at us. I make a mental note to "solve" this problem so it doesn't follow us when we leave.

"Just say what you want," Charles breaks the silence, his eyes still staring at Cecilia who nods and swallows hard.

"I understand your anger, and I know I have no right to ask for what I'm about to ask," she says and my hearing sharpens. "I live with guilt for years. Whether it's for Paolo or Jules, guilt and remorse follow me wherever I go. No matter what I try to do, they're always there." She looks at her hands. "Last year, I relapsed. I used heroin, once, but I used it. After years of resisting and not even going near drugs, I let my messed-up mind fall into the hole and I shot up." She lets out a desperate laugh and her eyes fill with water.

My body freezes and Charles makes a sound of scorn beside me. When he opens his mouth to say something, Cecilia cuts him off.

"Yes, I know I'm a whore, and I deserve the worst shit life has in store for me. But that's the thing. I deserve the bad things, but my son doesn't," she says firmly, looking at us seriously. "I need Vincenzo to have a good and decent life. I need to make sure he grows up loved and that he never lacks anything." She looks away for a moment to the table where Vincenzo was happily playing with the waitress and then back to us.

Cecilia takes a deep breath and leans forward. I could swear she was capable of asking for anything at that moment. Money, a house in a distant place, a period in rehab, anything.

"I can't take care of Vincenzo anymore," she asserts, her tone exuding bitterness. "I promised Jules that I would do everything to make him different from me. And that's why I came to you after all these years."

My head spins. She's asking for...? No, it's not possible.

"What do you mean by that?" Charles asks anxiously.

"Cecilia wipes the tears from her face with her hand, blinks a few times, and adopts a determined look, a look that I knew well. The same look I gave to myself in the mirror when I decided to leave Monaco. Suddenly, I feel afraid because my suspicions are confirmed.

"She wants us to take care of Vincenzo," I say.

#charles leclerc smut #charles leclerc x black!reader #charles leclerc x reader angst #charles lecrelc #pierre gasly #carlos sainz fanfic #f1 x reader #f1 imagine #lewis hamilton #formula 1

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gadriezmannsgirl · 1 year

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HEY BESTIE!! just found your blog and I'm about to read your work. But I was wondering if you can write me a request? Please. One where Pedri (my love) is dating a female f1 redbull driver and how their relationship would be giving the schedule and stuff or if you don't know about f1 (idk) you can do like an actress!reader and pedri having a crush on her and pining over her? If you don't wanna do these, I completely understand! But be safe and have an amazing day/night.

Hi darling! Yes I can! Pedri is life, isn't he? Freaking precious (Even tho my weakness is Gavi😅). Tysm, I really hope you like my writing, please let me know!

I do know my bits of F1, not a really hardcore fan of it so I'm gonna take the Actress!Reader since I don't really know everything from it.

I did this while waiting for my class at Uni, so I hope you like it. And be safe too! Have a great day/night

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Hard Crushing - Pedri González x Actress!Reader

"Oh my god, Pedri. You're really watching again The Queen's Gambit?" Fernando, Pedri's brother, asked him after sitting on the couch next to him

"Yes I am, what about it?" Pedri said not taking his eyes off of the TV

"You're obsessed with her, aren't you?"

"I'm not, she's just a good actress!" Fernando gave him a look raising his eyebrows "Ok, maybe I do am a bit obsessed with her. But she's Beautiful, have you given her a good look? Fucking gorgeous" Pedri shook his head "And don't even get me started on her look in Last Night in Soho... AND! During Black Widow? My goodness" Pedri groaned already picturing you in said movies "Also, there were a few rumors saying she's going soon to be appearing in CM, it'll be awesome to see her as a doctora"

"CM?"

"Chicago MED" Pedri replied almost instantly looking at his brother crazily for not recognizing the TV show "Si aparece ahí, me encantaría tener las mil y un enfermedades solo para que me cure" (If she's appearing there, I'd love to have a thousand sickness just so she could cure me)

"Tú estas loco" (You're crazy)

"Thank god, she talks Spanish too" Pedri says out of nowhere ", that way I wouldn't embarrass myself more than I would probably do if I ever get to meet her"

... ...

"What do you mean Y/N Y/L/N will be here?" Pedri asked in disbelief stopping his training to hear the gossip from Balde, Araujo and Ansu

"Yes, she's coming to Barcelona apparently she'll be filming a movie here so she's gonna stay for a while" Araujo explained

"And she's fan of the Barça so" Balde ended

"I know she's fan of Barça, you don't have to tell me things I clearly know" Pedri stated making Gavi laugh "Tell me more about this visit, that I didn't knew about"

"¡CHICOS!" They were interrupted by Xavi "It's not time to gossip, we've a Clásico to win!"

Pedri watched Ansu, Araujo and Balde run off not without telling them a quick "We'll talk later"

... ...

"What do you mean I'll be cooking in front and for Y/N Y/L/N?" Gavi, Ansu, Alejandro, Ferran, Araujo, Lewandoski and Ter Stegen laughed out loud after hearing the news and watching their friend's reaction

"Yes, she's coming to Camp Nou for a whole day, she'll see you training, we'll be giving her a tour and after that we'll be doing a video with her and you were the chosen one. That will make you both good" One of the staff said "Or if you don't want to do it, we can have Gavi or Lewandowski, they were also very asked for"

"¡NO, YO LO HAGO!" (NO, I'LL DO IT!) Pedri yelled surprising the poor woman, the guys laughing once more before he composed himself and added a quiet "I mean... I don't have any problem to do it. I'd love to"

"Okay, it's settled then. Next Tuesday, Pedri"

Gavi speaks up after the woman left "This is your big chance, bro. Meeting Y/N Y/L/N, the girl you've been practically in love with ever since 2019"

"What if I mess up? Say something weird? What if she thinks I'm crazy?"

"I don't think you can mess it up that much, Pedri" Ansu said shaking his head "She's a normal girl, you can do this, I mean... What's the worst thing you can do or say to her?"

"Be confident" Araujo said showing him a thumbs up

... ...

Next Tuesday

Practice had already ended, you had already met briefly the players and they were practicing while you were given the little tour around Camp Nou.

Also, while you were getting makeup done, Pedri was showering and getting himself dressed.

"How will I be able to not embarrass myself in front of her, if just by hearing her name I go like if I have a worm inside me?"

"That's a bit gross, dude"

"¡Joder!" Pedri turned around quickly nearly giving himself a whiplash and soon wished he hadn't.

You were standing there right besides him.

"Hijo de...- Ya la cagué" (Son of a... I fucked it up already) Pedri mumbled to himself but you laughed completely hearing him

"También hablo en Español, cariño" (I also speak Spanish, darling) You said giggling finding really cute his awkwardness.

Truth is that you absolutely loved Pedri and were also a bit nervous, he was your favourite player currently at Barça. And meeting him was like a dream come true.

"Don't worry about it" You said "You're my favourite player and I'm sweating my ass off too" He laughed out loud turning around to see you wearing a smile on your face.

"I'm sorry, you're just... Incredible" You blushed "Like, I've seen all of your movies and series"

"You're incredible too" you said "Like... I always see your matches and you never fail to amaze me" Pedri smiled feeling himself blushing at your words.

"Thank you, it means a lot"

"What are you cooking today?"

"Honestly, I don't know" You both laugh lightly "I just hope that whatever I'm making won't give you a stomach ache"

"You can't be that bad"

"The only thing I do great is serve a glass of water and burned rice" You laughed

"I trust you" You said smiling lightly "You'll do great" You showed your fist up, waiting for him to bump his with yours, when you were called to start recording

"God, she's so beautiful" Pedri mumbled but you still heard it

"Thanks. You're pretty handsome too" He groaned making you laugh. You were teasing him but at the same time you were waiting for him to lose his nerves and you, lose yours.

... ...

Pedri thought this was the worst and best day of his life, you were chatting with him while he was cooking.

Don't get him wrong, you're beautiful and chatting with you was easy, his nerves turned into excitement while talking. But also, the talking with you made it for him a bit impossible to fully concentrate in the cooking.

He just hoped everything tasted good. Or eatable.

"This is really spicy" You said taking a bite from the chicken and coughing up a bit "Like really, really spicy" The whole crew laughed and Pedri covered his hands

"I'm sorry" He said

"No. I like it, I just wasn't expecting that much" You pronounced That heavier making them laugh once more "But still this is delicious" you gave another bite to the chicken showing a thumbs up

"Rate 0/10?"

"9" You said inmediately "For those who say Pedri can't cook"

"Yo tambien lo digo" (I also say it) Pedri, himself said it in disbelief, you liked his food.

"Probablemente me de un dolor de estómago mas tarde, pero, por ahora está buenísimo" (It'll probably give me a stomach ache later, but, for now this is good)

"Esto ha sido Cocina en el Nou, si te ha gustado deja un like y sigue al Barça en todas las redes sociales" (This has been Kitchen in the Nou, if you liked this video leave a like y follow Barça in all social medias) Pedri said as you both waved at the camera

You stood besides him giving him a hug and soon the cameras stopped rolling only for the staff to bring you a Barça shirt.

It was your size with Pedri's name and his number 8.

"Thank you!" You said smiling. Both of you posed for a picture as Pedri quickly signed the shirt for you "It was a pleasure meeting you" You said hugging him once more.

It was almost time for you to go

"CanIhaveyournumber?" He asked quickly as you blinked a few times to recover from his quickness

"Pardon?"

"Can I have your number? It was really nice meeting you too and I would love to chat with you more, without cameras if you'd like" Pedri said.

You smiled

"Only if you take me out on a date"

"Only one?"

"You need to win me over, González. If you keep this moves up, you'll do it in a snap of fingers tho"

You didn't need to say it twice.

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@gaviypedrisbride